


Something dangerous comes to the Quad

by anarres



Category: Killjoys (TV)
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Insomnia, M/M, Stress, Surveillance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-07
Updated: 2020-01-25
Packaged: 2020-10-12 01:27:17
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 32,420
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20555942
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anarres/pseuds/anarres
Summary: Yalena Yardeen, a young woman with a dark past, comes to the Quad with John Jacobis and an illegal cargo of beet wine in tow. Khlyen, a mysterious and powerful officer of the interstellar RAC, immediately begins manipulating Yardeen through the local RAC Commander Alfred Turin. Turin, along with his loyal friends Big Joe Cyano and Bellus Hardy, desperately tries to understand who Yardeen is, what she wants, and most importantly how all of them can survive Khlyen's interference in their lives.Canon compliant, told mostly from the perspective of Alfred Turin.





	1. Allergic to bureaucracy

**Author's Note:**

> Rated Explicit because of a sex scene in chapter 12, otherwise it would be rated Mature for mature themes.

Alfred Turin walked into the Royale bar, ordered a drink, drained it, winced, and announced to no-one in particular: "I forgot everything on Westerley has an ugly aftertaste."

"If you don't like it go somewhere else," the bartender said without heat.

Turin replied: "Oh trust me, I intend to. There's just one piece of business I have to attend to first."

"Don't mind him," a voice called out. "He's just mad because his hair is cute as shit, but the rest of him is a shrivelled up old fossil."

Turin turned, grinned from cheekbone to cheekbone, and said with relish: "Bellus! And Big Joe!"

"Turin," the woman greeted, "nice to see you slumming it with us Westies."

Turin caught the bartender's eye and said: "Two more of what she's having," waggling his finger in the direction of Bellus, before sauntering over to the table.

"Three more!" Joe ammended, shouting loud enough to catch the bartender's attention. "He's paying."

The bartender flicked his gaze to Turin, who nodded.

Bellus pulled out a chair for him, but instead of sitting Turin rested his palms flat on the table and leaned in flirtatiously. His blond hair fell in front of his face. "Hello Bellus," he murmured, looking up at her through his eyelashes.

Then he dropped his gaze, noticing that Bellus's gun, which had been safely holstered a moment ago, now rested on her thigh, aimed squarely at Turin's crotch.

Bellus said in a bored tone: "Come any closer, Goldilocks, and I promise you'll wish you hadn't."

Turin backed off, pulled out a chair for himself and sat.

"One of these days," he murmured, "you're going to say yes to me."

Bellus leaned back, pushed her hands away from her and said: "heh," stretching the sound out for four or five syllables' worth of exhale.

"I'd say yes to you," Joe said.

"You're not my type," Turin snapped.

"Hurtful," Joe said mildly.

The bartender put three drinks down on the table. All three drank. Turin winced.

"Now Bellus..." Turin began.

"Shut it," Bellus snapped. She glared at him. "Do you really think I want to go live with you on that big ugly space station in the middle of nothing and nowhere?"

"You wouldn't have to live on the RAC," Turin protested. His voice turned wheedling. "You could live on Leith! Good beer, fresh air, green... cows, or whatever. Everyone wants to go to Leith."

"Pah," Bellus said. "All that wholesomeness and fresh air would give me hives."

"Or a healthy glowing complexion."

"I'm allergic to bureaucracy," Bellus said flatly.

"And yet," Turin murmured, "you're really really good at bureaucracy."

"I can be good at bureaucracy," Joe put in.

"You really can't," Turin said.

Joe shrugged as if to say: "fair enough".

Turin dropped the seductive act. "Look, Bellus. I need a competent, experienced Killjoy, someone who knows warrants inside and out, but who also knows how to balance a spreadsheet and work within RAC bureaucracy. Someone with impulse control and the ability to be bored for long periods of time without shooting anything."

"Yeah, no, that doesn't sound like me," Joe said, mostly to himself. He downed his beer, then stood and wandered over to talk to the pretty sexer standing at the bar.

Meanwhile Turin continued his pitch: "You work within RAC rules, regulations and procedures, you'd have the rank of captain, but you wouldn't work for the RAC, you'd be an independant contractor, running it as a private business. If you're smart about it, you can do pretty well for yourself. It can pay better than Killjoy work, even at your level. And it's a hell of a lot safer."

"A hell of a lot more boring, you mean," Bellus replied, "stuck in some office all day."

"O'wyn would like it."

"O'wyn would like a lot of things," Bellus said darkly.

Turin raised his eyebrows. "Trouble in paradise?"

"Eh." Bellus waved her hand.

"Eh? I don't know what that means."

"Nothing. It doesn't mean anything."

"Really."

Bellus sighed deeply. "Oh, it's just that O'wyn's been talking a lot of crap lately."

Turin's eyebrows were creeping up to his hairline. "Really?"

"Well, not crap. And if you tell him I said that I'll shoot you in the face. Forget it." Bellus stood. "We're done here. I've got a husband to go home to. Thanks for the beer, Turin." She stalked out of the bar.

Somehow, Bellus never just walked. She stalked. Sometimes she menaced.

Turin shouted after her: "You're my first choice, but I can't keep the position open forever! Think about it!"

Turin found himself sitting alone, but not for long. Joe re-joined him at the table.

"Thought you'd have moved your evening upstairs by now," Turin said casually.

"What?" Joe asked, baffled.

"You know, you and that sexer over there."

"Tirrah? Naw, we're just friends."

"Friends? Right." Turin snorted.

"Believe what you want," Joe shrugged, "Tirrah's not exactly my type. She's twenty-six, been knocking around for while, but she doesn't want to keep working at the Royale forever. She wants to get a Company job."

"Really. Doing what, massage?"

"Database systems administrator. She did well in math when she was in school. Now she's saving up to buy an apprenticeship."

"Huh."

The glittering Prima Dezz, owner of the Royale, appeared and placed two full beers on the table without being asked, winked, took the empties, and sauntered back to the bar.

"Cheers," Joe said. Turin nodded. Both men drank.

"So," Turin said, putting his drink down. "You and Kesha are..."

Kesha was Joe's long time, on-again, off-again girlfriend. The two of them were technically married, and she was even crazier than Joe.

"Back on again," Joe confirmed. "Things are good."

Turin drained his glass.

"Why," Joe asked, "you interested?"

"Heh." Turin barked out a laugh, setting his glass down with a thunk.

"My round?" Joe suggested.

"Naw." Turin stood. "I'm going home. This moon always gives me indigestion."


	2. Hijacked

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content note: masturbation.

Turin hummed to himself as he made his way across Westerley Main Space Docks. It was mostly quiet at this time. Hillary Oonam was amusing himself by dealing personally with a couple of idiot kids from outside the Quad who were insisting, straight-faced, that Oonam inspect their "import documents" for their cargo of, of all things, beet wine.

Oonam's melodious voice floated up above the background buzz of low-key machine noises, explaining what any five-year-old Westerlyn would already know: "The only people with permission to import anything in or out of the Quad are the Company, and Killjoys. Everyone else is smuggling. That would be you."

Chuckling to himself, Turin let himself into his little ship and said, apparently to no-one: "Let's go home."

There was a muted ka-thud of docking clamps de-magnetizing, and, moments later, the soothing whoosh of Westerley speeding away from him. He went to his bunk, removed his jacket and shoes and put them away, stripped out of his shirt and trousers and dumped those into the clothing hamper, and replaced them with loose, comfortable ones that he would wear to sleep.

"Ship, remind me," he said, "where are we with Neon Valley Streets?"

"The night before last we watched the latter half of _Episode 18: Cindy's Mistake_ and all of _Episode 19: Fandroids_. Next up is _Episode 20: Showdown in New Arcadia_. Would you like to hear the episode summary?"

"Go for it."

Turin pulled up a blanket and stretched out on the sofa.

"_Lady Paine impersonates Cindy at the annual Android auction. Jeanette and her team return to Neon Valley in defiance of 6IX Savage's order, leading to a confrontation with some android hunters. Meanwhile, Kitty and VND4's relationship is tested when VND4's relatives question whether a distributed non-linear network AI can really be happy with a Silico'9000 series._ Are you ready to watch the episode?"

"Hold off on that a minute, what's our eta for the RAC?"

"One hour, twenty-three minutes."

"Queue it up for me, but don't play it yet."

"Understood."

Despite what Bellus had said earlier, Turin did not really live on the RAC station.

The RAC of the Quad was a giant floating bureaucratic nightmare in semi-deep space, 71 levels of offices of sub-departments of departments, all enacting a complex, highly interconnected, and utterly impenetrable dance of military-bureaucratic law, procedure, and ritual.

Turin didn't live on the RAC. He docked there, most of the time. And he worked there, in his office on Level 44. But he lived on his ship. It was an important distinction. While the RAC was impersonal in a way that was huge and crushing, Turin's ship was impersonal in a way that was soothing and cozy. His own beloved little floating womb of plastic and steel and carbon, protecting him from the harshness of space and everyone else's reality.

On the rare occasions when Turin let other people onboard they complained that it was horrendously undecorated, and sometimes offered to help him pick out a plant or a doormat or something, which always made Turin grit his teeth because he knew it was futile to try to explain that he _preferred it this way_. Vases of flowers, pictures on the wall, colors that were different from the manufacturer's defaults - those were things you did because you had to, because you needed to convince other people you were normal. And he didn't, anymore. He had a stable, if aggravating, position within the RAC and no-one gave two shits how he lived as long as the work got done.

So he did what he pleased, and his ship still looked pretty much as it had when it was new. It wasn't that he didn't have any possessions - of course he did - but they all had a place in his filing system. Nothing was left just lying around.

He'd never really got the hang of the civilian style of life. He guessed it was because he's been somewhat spoiled as a kid; his parents had pushed him to excel at school, in academics and athletics, but they'd cooked and cleaned for him and never given him any chores to do. His job, they said, was to focus on his studies and get into the army on the junior officer track. So he got to age eighteen without ever having washed a dish or cleaned a toilet and did those things for the first time in the army, which was a shock. Other, less well-prepared cadets were startled to discover how painful sit-ups and push-ups and early-morning runs could be; Alfred Turin had been mildly traumatised to find out how disgusting it was to clean a toilet. And of course, just like army work-outs were the worst work-outs, army toilets were the worst toilets. It would have been better if his parents had eased him into it.

He'd tried, for a while, to act like a normal adult human. He'd tried cooking but he wasn't great at it, cleaning the mess was disgusting, and what happened if you didn't clean the mess was even more disgusting. He was perfectly happy living on ration bars, and his ship's kitchen was left pretty much untouched. He did like having nice clothes, so long as they fit in his filing system. And, screw it, screw everything, he liked having nice hair. He liked that it was long enough to run fingers through, he liked the light ginger color. He liked how fluffy it got if he didn't put in styling product. He'd been forced to keep it short as a young man but he could have it long now. And so what if he'd never learned the trick of living like a normal person, he was happy, godammit.

Turin settled himself into the couch and pulled up a blanket, but didn't bother having his ship play the _Neon Valley Streets_ episode. Instead he found his thoughts turning to Big Joe.

Was it gross to fantasize about someone you knew in real life when you masturbated? That was probably gross, right? That's what porn was for, to prevent people from having gross thoughts about their friends and co-workers while they rubbed one out. He should just ask his ship to play some porn.

He didn't, though.

Dammit, Joe wasn't even his type. He usually went for slender guys with lean muscle. Or women sometimes, but. He liked a man with a sleek look to him, not too tall and strong but not too built, with beautiful hair you could run your fingers through.

Shit, his type was basically men who looked as much like himself as possible. Was that narcissism?

And wasn't he probably-definitely too old to worry about crap like this? At this rate he'd end up senile and doddering around the retirement home on one of those walker things, but still having these stupid emo-teenager crises in his head about whether he liked his own hair too much.

Joe, though. Joe was a burly polar bear of man, with a solid layer of muscle all around him and another solid layer of fat around that. His wiry black hair was always uncombed and he had facial stubble that looked like it was painted on with a roller. But Joe made all that work. His eyes were big and dark and luminous. His mouth was... his lips. Would probably be really good to kiss, if he wanted to let you.

He was one of those people who felt too much, cared too much. It made him unpredictable, made him a pain in the ass of a Killjoy even though he was one of the most high-performing ones. The best they had, really. But unreliable. But hot as hell.

Turin found his hand sliding down his abdomen, under his pants, finding his cock. He scrunched around in the cushions, getting comfy. It wasn't gross if you didn't really even do it on purpose, right?

And that was when the ship's engine noises abruptly stopped. Godammit, he'd been just starting to get up a good rhythm.

"Ship?" Turin said.

"Yes?"

"We stopped."

Since that wasn't a question, the ship didn't bother to respond.

"Ship, why did we stop?"

"I do not know."

"You don't know?"

"That is correct."

Turin took his hand out of his pants and massaged his temples. "Ship," he said.

"Yes?"

"Restart your engines and set us on course for the RAC."

"I am sorry. I cannot do that."

"Godammit, why not?"

"I do not know."

"Well isn't that just..."

Turin was interrupted by the sound of the engines starting up again.

Turin bolted upright and lunged for the cockpit, where he glared at the navigation console.

"Ship," Turin said, "we're not on our way to the RAC station anymore, are we?"

"No."

"We're headed back to Westerley, aren't we?"

"Yes. We'll arrive back at Westerley Main Docks in approximately thirteen minutes."

"Wonderful. Can you at least - "

At that moment the navigation display flicked off of its own accord, and a moment later all five console display screens suddenly came to life, all displaying the same video: a man of about fifty, wearing an unfamiliar uniform.

Turin cursed.

The man in the video feed spoke. "Commander Alfred Olyevich Turin, listen carefully, your superiors at the Interstellar RAC have an important task for you to complete. If you fail in this task, the repercussions for you and for those under your command will be severe."

"What the shit?" Turin shouted. He was addressing his ship's computer, not the person on the video link, but the person on the video link didn't realize this.

"Pull yourself together," the video link man said disdainfully.

"Why is it doing that?" Turin all but shrieked.

"While I realise this communication may be unexpected, I assure you..." The man in the video link was saying.

"Shut up!" Turin yelled at the nearest monitor. "Ship, what the hell?"

"I am as confused as you are," the ship replied.

"That's not helpful!" Turin snapped. He snarled at the monitor: "Are you doing this?"

"Yes," replied the mysterious man. "Obviously."

"What do you want?" Turin snarled.

The mysterious man spoke slowly, as if to a small child: "That is what I have been trying to explain. Are you ready to listen?"

Turin grinded his teeth.

"Good. Then I'll begin again. First I must stress that if you fail in this little task I am about to set, the consequences will be severe. You already see how easily I've usurped control over your ship's communication and navigation systems. But that is only a small hint at what I am capable of."

"Are you monologue-ing?" Turin asked incredulously. "Is this a villain monologue? Am I in a comic book?"

The mystery man gave a little sigh. "I see. You still aren't taking this seriously."

"Fraid not!" Turin said brightly. His hands flew over his ship's controls.

"Ah. You're attempting to contact your superiors at the RAC of the Quad," the mystery man observed. "That's not a bad idea actually."

The screens all went dead.

"Ship..." Turin said slowly.

"I have a video comm request from Admiral Patel," the ship interrupted him, "should I put her on screen?"

"Yes!" Turin barked, and his boss's boss appeared on the comm screen. "Sir," he said in aknowledgement.

"Turin, nice pyjamas," the Admiral sniffed. "I take it you've been in contact with our colleague Khlyen from Interstellar."

"You're telling me that weirdo is actually part of the RAC?" Turin asked incredulously.

"I'm telling you that 'weirdo' is an officer working at a very high level within the Interstellar RAC, and if you care at all about your career you need to start showing him the appropriate respect."

At that Turin stood up straight, squared back his shoulders, and bit out: "Understood. Sir. If you are in contact with Officer Khlyen please convey to him my apologies."

"He doesn't give a shit about your apologies," Patel said bluntly. "Now listen very carefully. A young woman named Yalena Yardeen arrived at Westerley Main Docks today. Her ship contained an unsanctioned cargo of beet wine from outside the Quad and was therefore impounded by the Company."

Turin bit down on the inside of his cheek, hard.

"A short time later Yardeen was falsely arrested by a Killjoy named Joe Cyano who mistook her for an unknown assailant who had shot him."

"Joe was shot? Is he okay?"

"I don't care, and neither should you. Yardeen and her associate are currently in Cyano's custody. You will go to Yardeen as soon as your ship arrives on Westerley and you will recruit her as a RAC agent working in the Quad."

"What?"

"I can tell you're not having your best day ever, Turin, so I'll repeat that very, very crucial directive. Get to Yardeen immediately, keep her close, keep her safe, make sure no harm comes to her, and recruit her for the RAC without letting her know that you are acting under orders. Do this, and your career will continue as usual. Fail, and I suspect Khlyen will have you transformed into an ugly smear that Oonam will have to have his people hose off the docks."


	3. Big Joe saves the day

Turin called Joe from his handheld comm, not his ship's one, although there was no reason to believe that device wasn't just as much under Khlyen's control. There was no answer. Turin immediately called again, got no response, called a third time, got a machine voice asking him to record a message, swore, disconnected, called again.

"Little busy right now boss," the Killjoy's voice rang out.

"Well you're about to get busier. Did you just arrest a woman named Yalena Yardeen?"

"Yes. Why?"

"Are you with her right now? At the RAC facility next to the docks? Do you have her in your custody?"

"Yes. Boss, you're acting weird, what's going on?"

"Good. Keep her there. Under no circumstances let her slip away."

"Wasn't planning on it. The bitch shot me. At the Royale, in front of a bunch of people." Joe sounded more aggrieved at the loss of dignity than the actual physical injury.

"I don't care. Keep her close, don't let her get away from you. Do not harm her or abuse her in any way."

"What do you take me for?" Joe asked, offended. "And did you forget the part where she _shot me?_"

"Where?"

"I told you, at the Royale."

"No, I mean -"

"Leg. I'll live."

"Get it looked at before you sleep tonight. And recruit Yalena Yardeen to the RAC."

"What?"

"I don't have time to explain and it wouldn't make sense even if I did. Recruit her. Convince her to stay in the Quad and join the RAC."

"Boss, are you feeling okay?"

"I don't have time to talk. Recruit her. Be nice to her. Charm her."

"Charm? Have you met me? Turin. You seriously want this kid for the RAC?"

Turin let out a bitter little laugh. "It's not about what I want, believe me. You can recruit her associate too if that helps. But don't let her know you're doing it under orders. She has to believe you saw how great she is and you just couldn't help yourself from spontaneously trying to recruit her."

"Right," Joe said, baffled and sarcastic, "because that's exactly how RAC recruitment works."

"It is now. I'm on my way there now, I'll be with you in a few minutes, just sit tight and woo Yalena Yardeen."

Just as Turin ended the call his ship announced that they were, for the second time that day, docking at Westerley. He hurried to get dressed and armed again, and set off at a jog for the RAC facility by the docks.

Along the way his handheld went off. He expected it to be Joe calling him back, but instead it was an alert, informing him that for some reason Hillary Oonam had put a courtesy hold on Yardeen and her accomplice.

Turin had not instructed his comm to provide him with any such alerts.

Whatever, one problem at a time.

Turin arrived at the RAC facility, mildly out of breath, in time to catch the tail end of Big Joe's interrogation session with Yardeen. He peered into the booth. Yardeen was indeed, as expected, one of the beet wine kids from earlier. Her little associate stood waiting nearby.

Turin cursed internally. Both of them looked about 18, maybe 20. There was no way in hell either one of them had the skills or experience needed to make a successful Killjoy.

He caught the tail end of their conversation.

"What are you doing in my Quad?" Joe asked, glaring at the kid.

Yardeen leaned forward, met his glare, smirked: "Leaving."

Shit.

"Alright," Joe said.

"Not alright," Turin muttered under his breath.

"I got a cold dinner and a hot wife to get to," Joe went on. "Come on. Let's go. I'll take the two of you for processing."

Turin stepped in, eyeing Yardeen as he did so. "Hold up, Hills put a courtesy hold on these two. Wants you to bring them by for questioning."

"About what?" Yardeen demanded.

Turin glanced at his handheld. "Theft of property and crimes against the Company."

The unimportant one burst out indignantly: "We've been on this stupid moon six hours, what the hells did we steal?"

"Let's go ask Oonam," Joe replied with a sigh. "Okay, looks like the four of us are going for a little walk. Turin, I got Yardeen here, you wanna grab the other one?"

Instead of grabbing the boy, Turin shoudered past him in order to grab Joe by the shoulder and hiss into his ear: "Did you recruit her?"

Joe shook him off, annoyed. "In the seven minutes since I talked to you?" he asked, keeping his voice low. "No."

Yardeen and the other one exchanged a look.

Turin grabbed the not-Yardeen one's elbow. "Okay, Beet Wine, let's go."

"Hey, I'm wearing cuffs, there's no need to manhandle," the boy complained as Turin pulled him along.

"Go on then," Turin gave him a little push, "I'll be behind you. Right behind you."

"There's no trust," the boy said huffily.

"Play nice or get tased, kids," Joe put in.

Yardeen tilted up her chin, quirked an eyebrow and extended her elbow to the boy, who went to her side and, despite the cuffs, managed to look like a gentleman taking his lady's arm. The two of them strode off looking like they owned the place, like the two men trailing behind them were bodyguards, not jailors.

Because they were evil little shits who wanted to give Turin an ulcer.

They were a strikingly attractive pair, Turin would give them that. The boy was blond and pale, like Turin himself, and wore his blue eyes heavily rimmed with black kohl, while the girl had a mane of curly dark hair and the features of a holo star, and walked with a sinuous fuck-you-or-kill-you strut, all hips and flashing eyes. Heads turned as they went past. Turin used the distraction to stealthily send Joe a series of text messages from his pocket.

DON'T REACT SET YOUR COMM TO SILENT

_bli-ding_

Joe looked at his comm.

OONAM CAN'T HAVE YARDEEN

_bli-ding_

KEEP HER CLOSE KEEP EYES ON HER

_bli-ding_

FIND OUT WHO SHE IS AND WHAT SHE WANTS

_bli-ding_

I SAID SILENT

_bli-ding_

"Your phone's really blowing up, there, huh?" The unimportant beet wine kid noted. "If you have somewhere else you need to be, we don't mind, really."

"Is it your hot wife?" Yardeen asked with a smirk.

"Yeah," Joe said, shooting Turin a glare, "she gets clingy. And micromanage-ey." He set his comm to silent mode, noticing as he did the latest of the messages:

YOU TALK TO HILLS YOU'RE GOOD AT THAT

The four of them arrived at the Company lock-up, where Hillary Oonam was waiting for them.

"So what did they steal?" Joe asked Oonam gruffly as they walked in.

Oonam replied: "No flaming idea."

It turned out Yardeen and her partner were not quite the naive and bumbling smugglers of beet wine they pretended to be. The beet wine thing had been a gambit to get an illegal device into the Company's impound locker; a device capable of disabling all the Company security tech from the inside long enough for Yardeen to carry out her real heist, whatever that was.

Not-Yardeen started babbling that the two of them were innocent, that clearly someone had tricked them into transporting the device without their knowledge. Turin thought he was probably half right; out of the two of them Turin had Yardeen pegged for the real leader, and she might not have told her little boyfriend / crime partner / patsy the whole play.

Meanwhile, Yardeen told a story about some kind of poison that melted your lungs, which she claimed to be able to recognize by scent.

And then just as everything was going completely to shit, Big Joe stepped in and saved the day. He talked Oonam into letting him keep the beet wine kids in his custody, and promised to figure out the poison thing if Oonam would give him a warrant. Joe acted like he truly believed the kids were innocent of any serious crime; it was such a convincing performance Turin almost believed it, so he was pretty sure Yardeen and the other one did. And in a crowning stroke of genius, Joe convinced the kids to stick close and work with him to prove their 'innocence'.

Turin just stayed in the background and kept his mouth shut. You didn't interfere with magical genius like that, you just got the hells out of its way and let it do its good work.

Oonam issued the warrant, Joe took the warrant, and Oonam _let them all go_.

Turin made a mental note that he owed Joe a favour for all this, a big one. 

When it was all over Turin asked the Killjoy: "Where to now?"

"We're going back to the Royale," Joe replied.

"You're going to the bar?"

"I need to think."

Turin shrugged. "Fine. I'll come with."

Joe eyed him up and down. "Kids, you wanna give us a minute?"

The kids both shuffled back a step and made a half-hearted attempt to look like they weren't eavesdropping.

Joe slid his arm over Turin's shoulder and turned them both around to face away from the kids.

"Boss, you know this is crazy, right?"

"Oh, I'm aware," Turin said darkly.

"I mean, on a scale from one to ten, this is squirrels. You gotta tell me what's going on."

Turin closed his eyes and did a slow inhale-hold-exhale-pause before opening them. "Joe," he said, "I know it's crazy."

"Okay."

"I can't tell you anything more than what I already told you."

Joe stared at Turin, searching his face as if he was expecting to find something there.

"You want me to recruit them."

"Yardeen, yeah. The other one I don't care about one way or the other."

Joe kept staring. It was disconcerting.

"Is someone leaning on you?" the Killjoy asked gruffly.

"Yeah, but not like you think."

"What do you mean, not like I think."

"I mean it's not the kind of problem that can be solved by killing someone or threatening to kill someone."

"All problems can be solved that way."

"Not this one."

"Look, Turin, I know you're a law and order, rules and regulations kind of guy..."

"Oh for crying out loud."

"But you have to know you have friends, friends who would do anything for you. And some of those friends are not so nice. Whoever's leaning on you, they need to know that."

Turin held out a hand as though to stop the flow of the discussion. "Joe," he began.

"You think someone's tracking you? Spying on you?" Joe interrupted.

"Joe, it's in the RAC!" Turin burst out. "It's in the RAC. High up. Interstellar. It's - it's so big it could crush you and me and everyone we know and barely notice the difference. So drop it. Recruit Yalena Yardeen, do everything I told you to do, and forget this conversation ever happened."

Joe blinked, went blank for a second or two, then said: "Okay."

"Great!" Turin approved. "Now come on, we have a bar to get to."

"Okay, but you're not coming. You've been acting even twitchier than usual and it's stressing me out. Go home and sleep, I'll take care of Yardeen."

Turin didn't even want to argue with that. "You're a prince among men, Cyano," he said seriously, "I owe you."

Joe just nodded, clapped Turin's shoulder, then went to gather up his two little ruffians and herd them toward Pree's bar.


	4. Something dangerous

Turin returned to his ship and, for the second time that day, departed from Westerley on a course for the RAC station. He instructed his ship to handle the piloting and docking automatically if at all possible, since he planned to be asleep long before arrival. He also set the ship to running every security, diagnostic and debugging routine it had, and called Bellus. 

"Wasn't expecting to hear your voice again today," Bellus smirked at him through the video link. 

"Who are you talking to?" asked a voice offscreen. 

"Why, you jealous?" Bellus shot back, without looking away from Turin. 

"Yes," the off-screen voice said flatly. 

Turin's eyebrows went up. "Is this a good time to talk?" he asked. 

"It's a great time to talk, but my answer's still no." 

"It's not about that," Turin replied, "I need a favour. A different favour." 

"Alright then." Bellus leaned forward. "Did you hear some bitch shot Big Joe? Happened at the Royale, not long after I left." 

Turin rubbed the bridge of his nose. "I did hear about that, yes." 

"He arrested her," Bellus said proudly. "Takes more than one blaster shot to keep our man down. I guess that bitch will think twice next time she decides she wants to take on a Killjoy in _our own damn bar_." 

The Royale actually belonged to Prima Dezz, but given Pree's policy of handing out free drinks to Killjoys in return for a little light bouncing and law enforcement - yeah, it was pretty much their bar. 

Turin ran a hand through his hair. Joe's leg was another loose end that needed tying up. "I forgot you people are all terrible gossips," he said. "Did you happen to hear if Joe got his injury looked at by a medic?" 

"No idea," Bellus replied, "do you know where he is now?" 

"He was on his way back to the Royale." 

"Pree will take care of him then." 

Turin nodded, satisfied with that. 

"So what's this favour?" Bellus asked. 

"I need you to do some research for me. Nothing fancy. I only want you to use publicly available sources, nothing that could raise any flags. And this is a personal favour, nothing to do with the RAC. Don't you dare even think about trying to bill me for this." 

"If you only want publicly available information what do you need me for? Why not do it yourself?" 

"Because I'm tired, and you're better at it." 

Bellus accepted the flattery with a grin. "Alright, what do you want to know?" 

"Not what, who. All I have is a name and some video footage." 

"What kind of video are we talking about? Hologram quality, 180-360 solid angle scans, or..." 

"No. More like, some shitty video from the hidden cameras in Pree's bar." 

"Eh," Bellus grunted in disappointment. "Well I won't be able to do much, not with publicly available sources, are you sure you don't want me to..." 

"No!" Turin barked. "Actually, forget it. That's a goddamn order. I shouldn't even have brought it up." 

"What's got you so twitchy?" Bellus asked. 

"Nothing, forget it." 

"Turin," Bellus said slowly, her voice dropping half an octave, "what's going on." 

"Drop it." 

They glared at each-other. 

"Look," Turin said quietly, "I think something has come to the Quad, something dangerous. I haven't figured out yet what it is or how to deal with it. So drop it, and forgodssake don't go looking for restricted info." 

Bellus held up her hands in defeat. "Alright, I'll drop it." She shrugged. "But you might as well give me the name and Pree's garbage-cam footage and let me do my sad little public record search." 

"Sure. The name's Yalena Yardeen." 

"You mean Yalena Yardeen, _Murder Princess_?" Bellus asked slowly. "The Red Bride of Kefferee?" 

"I have no idea what you just said," Turin replied. 

"Don't you watch the news?" Bellus was grinning now. "Turin, you should take an interest in what's going on in the world." 

"I do watch the news," Turin retorted, "the news that's actually news. Not your celebrity gossip or whatever that shit is." 

The phrase _"Kefferee Murder Princess"_ was pinging some vague memory in the back of his skull, now that Bellus had mentioned it. 

"Then why are you asking me about Yalena Yardeen?" 

"Long story. Tell me what you know about Yardeen? Please?" 

"Ohhh, I like hearing you beg." Bellus fluttered her lashes mock-flirtatiously. "Well. It would have been two, maybe three months ago now..." 

"More like four and a half," put in the voice offscreen. 

"O'wyn'll know all about it," Bellus said fondly. "Celebrity murders are a hobby of his." 

"Some people like pottery," Turin muttered. 

Bellus's husband O'wyn appeared behind her shoulder. 

"It was the most sordid thing," O'wyn said happily. "They never even found the body. Or not all of it, anyway. And it's just such a great story. An instant classic, really. 

"A young prince is crowned after his father the king dies suddenly in _very_ suspicious circumstances. The young king needs a bride and all the great families of the realm throng to introduce their sons and daughters to him in search of a match and an alliance. 

"But the young king knows that alliances are double-edged swords. Whatever bride he chooses, her enemies will become his. So he seeks a bride with no enemies, pure and unworldly, to bring his people joy instead of strife. 

"A lovely maid, high-born and noble, she cared nothing for political intrigues, so she renounced all her lands and titles for a life of peaceful contemplation in the Royal Cloister. There she studied the gentle arts of music and poetry, singing and dancing, literature and philosophy, and true, pious religion. 

"The people of the realm approved the young king's choice and they rejoiced, and there were three days of feasting and dancing, and on the third day the young king went to the Royal Cloister to claim his bride. 

"But it turns out the seemingly sweet and innocent maid had a dark secret. No-one knows for sure what happened that night. You know how the media loves to cover things up, especially when there's royalty involved. The bride disappeared and was never seen again. And as for the young king - they didn't exactly find his body, but they found _parts_ of it, if you know what I mean." O'wyn sighed dreamily. "There's even a drink named after her, the _Bloody Yalena_." 

Turin asked: "Do they make it out of beet wine?" 

"No," O'wyn replied, "It's tomato juice with raw shellfish, black pepper, celery, and young hokk. It's completely disgusting. Just like what remained of her husband after she got through with him". 

"Ew," Bellus said cheerfully.

"You know, this is nice," O'wyn said to Bellus, "I hardly ever get to meet the people you work with. We should have Turin around for dinner some time." 

"That would be great," Turin said, absolutely not meaning it. 

Without warning the video feed of Bellus and O'wyn disappeared and was replaced by Khlyen's frowning image. 

Turin shuddered with his whole body. 

"Where is Yalena?" Khlyen asked without preamble. 

"Right now?" Turin asked. 

Khlyen's eyes narrowed. "If any harm comes to her, Turin, I promise the same harm will be visited on you ten-fold. Where is she?" 

"She's fine," Turin said quickly, then hastily added: "sir. She's under the care and protection of my most trusted and experienced agent." 

"And that would be Joe Cyano? The one that accused her of shooting him?" 

"That was an unfortunate mistake," Turin said. "He'll be dropping the charge, of course." 

"Yes, I've already taken care of that," Khlyen replied, as if stating an unimportant detail. 

"You... what?" 

"Where is she right now, Turin?" 

"She's with Joe Cyano, a Level 5 RAC agent who I personally selected to..." 

"You don't know," Khlyen said, as if to himself. 

The screen went dead. 

Turin forced himself to do a round of inhale-hold-exhale-pause. Then another. He relaxed his painfully-clenched fists, one and then the other. 

He started pacing. 

He knew exactly what he should do. Nothing. Was that psycho Khlyen at this very moment tracking Joe down, sending spies to surveil him and hijack his tech, as he had no doubt already done to Turin? Would Khlyen soon be threatening Joe with murder or worse if he should fail to protect Khlyen's precious Murder Princess? Then Turin should do nothing. Joe could handle himself well enough, and there was nothing Turin could do to help anyway. 

He wanted, very badly - _so,_ so very badly - to warn Joe that his new protege was in all likelihood even more dangerous, more violent and unpredictable than Turin had previously believed - but again, Joe could handle himself. And Joe wasn't the kind of person to listen to warnings like that anyway. 

There certainly wasn't any sense in checking in with the RAC system. Better to do that tomorrow, from his office at the RAC, after a night's sleep. No point looking now. 

Don't do it, he told himself. 

Don't look. 

Plenty of time for looking later. Now, you need sleep. 

Turin grinded his teeth and paced back and forth in the small space of his ship's cockpit. 

"Ship," said Turin, "link me into the RAC, authorization code Turin FK94R." 

"Access granted". 

He looked. 

Joe's charges against Yardeen and the other one were gone. Not the-charges-were-laid-and-later-the-charges-were-dropped gone, but not-in-the-system-at-all, it-never-happened gone. 

Turin paced. 

Khlyen was Interstellar, his rank so far above Turin's that it didn't bear thinking about. Someone like that didn't need to bother going through the proper channels. He could just override any local system whenever he felt like it. It was against protocol, of course, but what did protocol matter to someone like Khlyen? He didn't have to worry about rules and procedures, he could just do what he wanted. And now he was part of Turin's life. Anything could happen. 

Turin paced. 

He wanted to call Joe. Just to check in. It would probably make Joe feel like he was being checked up on or micromanaged or whatever, but he still wanted to do it. 

He had to call. 

He absolutely shouldn't call. It would just make Joe worried, and if Joe got worried... 

Turin, for all his rank and experience, was mostly an administrator these days. He knew very well that 95% of problems could be solved by yelling a lot, completing the necessary paperwork, and then waiting for the problem to go away on its own. But Joe... Joe had a more direct, and violent, approach to problem-solving. He was an incredibly competent Killjoy, but he had never gone up against anything like Khlyen before. And if he did... 

Turin needed to keep Joe as far away as possible from Khlyen. He needed to make sure Joe never even heard the name 'Khlyen' if he could help it. Telling Joe as much as he already had had been a stupid mistake, he needed to button that shit up from now on. 

He paced. 

This was stupid. Wearing a hole in the floor wasn't fixing anything. 

"This is stupid," he said out loud. 

"Is there anything I can do to help?" asked his ship. 

"Probably not, but thanks, ship." 

Turin paced a little more. 

"Actually ship, put in a call to Joe Cyano, flag it non-urgent, audio only." 

Joe's voice came through a moment later, sounding un-stressed: "Turin, you still awake?" 

"Just about. Just checking in. In a non-micromanagey way. So, things are good?" 

"Everything's fine, boss." Joe sounded amused, not annoyed, so that was good. 

"Good, that's good," Turin said, wanting to tear his own hair out at the inanity. 

"Yup," Joe said agreeably. 

"And our new recruits, they're good, right?" 

"Yup, they're fine." 

"Good. Where are they now?" 

"Qresh." 

"Okay", Turin said, and abruptly ended the call before Joe could tell him any more things he didn't want the people surveiling his ship to hear. 

Why had he called? There was no possible good outcome. 

He paced all night. 


	5. Warrants for Yalena

After a long, sleepless night Turin went in to work to find that Yardeen and her boyfriend had been officially accepted to the RAC, with Joe as their sponsor. 

Yardeen _started at level five_. Every time Turin thought about that - and he thought about it often - he wanted to claw his own hair out. Khlyen didn't even bother to inform him. She simply appeared as Level 5 on the computer system, like some mythological water spirit sprung full-formed from the sea spray, and all Turin's directives to override it were simply and mysteriously ignored. 

He went through all his usual routines in a daze, with the fear of what that psycho Khlyen and his Murder Princess might do next hanging over him. 

He didn't have to wait long to find out; it was mid-afternoon when his main work console flicked off and then on again, with Khlyen's face on the screen, Khlyen's voice emerging from the speakers. 

"Turin, I trust this is a convenient time," the man said, and then continued without waiting for a response: "we have some things to discuss. I am pleased that Yalena has returned from her little excursion to Qresh. I don't like her going there. See to it that she stays away from Qresh from now on." 

"Sir," Turin began, "that isn't how the RAC works. This isn't the army. Our agents work independently. They choose their own warrants, and they go wherever they need to, to fulfill those warrants." 

"You presume to tell me how the RAC works?" Khlyen asked. His tone was deceptively mild. He even smiled a little. 

"That's just reality," Turin said. 

"There is something you should know about me," Khlyen said, still smiling slightly, "I do not appreciate failure. I do not tolerate it in any of my servants, and you are my servant now, whether you wish to be or no. Perhaps I should simply have you executed; it may be that your replacement will serve me better. But I wouldn't stop with just you. The RAC agent Joe Cyano, he's a friend of yours, is he not? He is officially Yalena's mentor, but he is hardly suitable for that position. Perhaps I'll get rid of him as well." 

"You can't just go around executing people," Turin said angrily. 

"No, I can't, can I?" Khlyen said thoughtfully. "I would have to resort to other means." 

They glared at each-other through the console screen. 

"Well," Khlyen said, suddenly switching to bright and cheerful. "Now that Yalena is a reclammation agent, she'll be needing her first warrant. I have something in mind." A new warrant pinged on Turin's console. "See that she takes it." 

"That's not how the RAC works!" Turin burst out. 

Khlyen simply glared at him. 

"But I'll see what I can do," he added reluctantly. "Sir." 

The screen flicked off. Turin checked the warrant and noted with horror that it was a Level 5. A kill warrant. He stared into space, trying to decide what to do with this, and concluded that he was going to do nothing. Even if he tried to get Joe to get Yardeen, a brand new 20-year-old RAC agent who never should have been a RAC agent in the first place, to take a Level 5 warrant, Joe would refuse. Because Joe wasn't a psychopath. Of course Turin could try to go around Joe, contact Yardeen directly, but even if Yardeen was competent to do the work there was no reason to think she'd listen to him. She certainly didn't seem like the type to follow orders given by someone she didn't like or trust. The whole thing was ridiculous anyway. She wasn't taking the warrant, and Khlyen was just going to have to deal with that. 

Hopefully he would deal with it without killing anybody. 

Later than day Khlyen once again hijacked Turin's communications systems to complain that Yardeen had accepted a warrant. A Level 1 warrant. 

"It's her first warrant," Turin defended wearily. 

"It's a waste of her time," Khlyen replied icily. "Yalena is no ordinary reclammation agent. She has special training. She is meant for better things than this." 

Turin suppressed a shudder at the thought of the 'better things' that Yardeen was apparently 'meant for', and said reasonably: "She's just acclimatising herself. She may have, ah, special training, but she's new to the RAC and she's doing what any new agent should do, getting used to how we do things before taking on higher level warrants. Look, it's literally her first day." 

"It's literally her second day, you imbecile," Khlyen bit out. "See that she progresses quickly to Level 4 and Level 5 warrants. Especially Level 5. She needs to make use of her skills." 

The screen flicked off, and Turin sighed in relief. 

He wracked his brain for what he was going to say to Joe, how he was going to pass on Khlyen's demands without sounding crazy, and in the end he just sent a text-only message, 

**_ Yardeen needs to take higher level warrants._**

which Joe never acknowledged or responded to. 

Then he returned home to his ship, went to bed, and tried, and failed, to sleep. 

His insomnia was disturbed a few hours later by a message from Khlyen - it was just a text-and-data message, perhaps Khlyen was actually being thoughtful by not demanding face-to-face communication while Turin was in the part of his diurnal cycle designated for sleep. Not that it mattered, since Turin couldn't sleep anyway. The mesage was just another Level 5 warrant, with a note that Yardeen should take it. 

Turin stared at that for a long while, wondering what to do with it, and as with the previous one he eventually did nothing at all. 

The next morning he was dozing in front of a news broadcast when his ship's AI alerted him that he had a video call request from Joe. 

"Put him on," Turin said, relishing the feeling of control that came from tech operating in the normal way, with the caller unable to open a connection until invited to do so by the person being called. 

Joe looked furious. He opened with: "Turin, what the hell is this?" 

"What the hell is what?" Turin asked, snapping into problem-solving mode. Joe was usually level-headed; if he was angry, something was really wrong. 

"This is _bullshit_," Joe hissed. "I thought Dutch wasn't suposed to know she's special." 

"She isn't," Turin replied, patiently waiting for Joe to start making sense. "You mean Yardeen, right?" 

"She goes by Dutch now. And she's not stupid, if you pull shit like this she's going to know she's different," Joe said angrily. "It's hard enough when I have to tell them about a million lies so they think the way they joined the RAC is normal. And they haven't even really met any other Killjoys yet, when they do it'll be even harder. I'm going to have to call in a lot of favours just to keep people saying the right things to them." 

"Joe," Turin said patiently, "what happened?" 

"The _warrant_," Joe said angrily. "You're the one that did it. She didn't accept this. Except it says on the system that she did accept it, authorized by you. How does that work? How am I suposed to explain this to her?" 

"Joe, just humour me, what's the name on the warrant?" 

The tone of Joe's voice changed from angry to worried. "Kyla Sylvestra." 

It was the warrant Khlyen had chosen for Yardeen. "Give me a second, I'm going to a different console," Turin said. "Ship, transfer video call to Cockpit Console 3." He went to his cockpit, which was better set up for this kind of work, logged into the RAC system and flicked through the recent warrants. Sure enough, the warrant was marked as having been claimed by Yardeen, and authorized as such by Turin. 

"It wasn't you, was it?" Joe asked, speaking more quietly than before, "I should have known it wasn't you, you'd never go against the proper procedures like that. It was someone else." 

"Of course it was me," Turin replied a little too cheerfully. "Believe it or not, I do make mistakes. Just not very often. Maybe one mistake per decade. So this is my one." He was rambling, buying himself time to think. "Tell Yardeen it was an administrative error made by me. I'd say I'm sorry but I don't really do apologies, especially not to subordinates, especially ones who've been RAC agents barely three days, so just tell her this type of mistake is rare and I'll get it sorted out on the system later today." 

"Turin," Joe said. 

"Thank you for bringing it to my attention," Turin said, making it sound like a dismissal. 

"Thanks Turin," Joe replied quietly, "take care." 

"You too," Turin said. "Ship, dismiss video call." 

Turin knew of no way of contacting Khlyen. Khlyen contacted him, he didn't contact Khlyen. He would have to wait for Khlyen's next hijack of his communications tech to discuss it. 

Infuriatingly, now that Turin actually wanted Khlyen to call, he didn't. Turin went to work as usual, wrote a report, attended a meeting, had the report returned to him because it had a bunch of stupid errors he'd made because he was sleep-deprived and not really paying attention, drank a lot of coffee, re-wrote the report. Around mid-afternoon he received a text-only message from Joe: 

_** How much longer until that administrative error gets fixed? She's asking a lot of questions. If it doesn't get filled in time she'll be in breach. **_

Turin headed to Medical on the 40th floor, where he paid a visit to an aquantaince. 

"Turin, how are you?" Dr Asher greeted him. "Come in, come in. I wasn't expecting you, but the door's always open. What can I do for you?" 

"I need a favour," Turin said. "The kind of favour you don't write about in your logs." 

"Is it drugs?" Dr Asher asked bluntly. 

"No. I need you to give a serious, life-threatening medical condition to a RAC agent named Yalena Yardeen. Not in real life, just on the system. I need you to leave it there for a few hours, or until I tell you I don't need it anymore, and then make it disappear, say it was an admin error or whatever." 

"Intriguing," said Dr Asher, "and weird. What's in it for me?" 

"I'll owe you a favour of equal magnitude," Turin replied pleasantly. "You abuse your power for me, and some day, when you need it, I'll abuse my power for you." 

"Huh," Dr Asher said thoughtfully. "Okay, yeah, that sounds good. Any particular kind of illness or condition?" 

"The more horrifying and outlandish, the better." 

"How does parasitic roundworm infection sound?" 

"Sounds great." 

Dr Asher tapped at her console for several moments. "Okay, it's in the system." 

"Great, I'll send you a message when I'm ready for it to go away. Don't worry about the content of the message, just that I send a message at all means I'm done with this." 

"Great! Always a pleasure to see you, Turin." 

"You too, doc." 

Turin didn't have to wait long. But the time he returned to his office, Khlyen was already glaring at him through his comm screen. 

"Relax," Turin said, walking into the room and shutting the door behind him, "she doesn't have a parasitic infection or whatever it was, that was just to get you to contact me." 

"If you have harmed her..." Khlyen began. 

"She's fine," Turin interrupted, "the illness was completely made up. Just like that Level 5 warrant she supposedly accepted, that I supposedly authorized. All made up. By you, I assume." 

"How dare you question me?" Khlyen demanded. 

Khlyen didn't look that great, actually. His clothes and hair were impeccable as always, but his skin was grey, his features more haggard than usual. Turin wondered if he wasn't the only one losing sleep. 

"I am _helping_ you," Turin said through gritted teeth. "You said I'm your servant, well fine, I am being a good servant by telling you, you need to get rid of that fake warrant right goddamn now. She didn't accept it. Yardeen is intelligent, she is going to realise that someone is manipulating her when she gets mysteriously signed up to a mysterious warrant that she never really signed up to! You can't just put something in the system and have it come true in real life!" 

Khlyen actually looked weary, and sad. "She has to complete the warrant," he said, "otherwise the RAC will come for her next. That's how Level 5 warrants work. She has to fill the warrant, she has no choice." 

"I told her it was a clerical error," Turin said, "I told her she doesn't have to finish the warrant." 

"What?" shouted Khlyen, furious. 

"I am helping you," Turin said again. "If she has to fill the warrant she'll know she's being manipulated. Is that what you want?" 

"What matters is that she does the work," Khlyen replied angrily. 

"If she knows she's being manipulated she'll run away again," Turin said. "Isn't that what happened last time? She ran from you because she doesn't want to be under your control, she wants to live her own life - that's why you're doing this, working through me instead of talking to her directly, because if she caught even a whiff of you she'd run, wouldn't she? If you do this, she'll fill the warrant alright, but then she'll disappear again and you'll lose even the small amount of control you have now!" 

"Silence!" roared Khlyen. 

A few moments passed. 

"The warrant is deleted," Khlyen said quietly. "If you ever speak to me in this manner again, I will have your vocal chords removed." 

The screen flicked off. 


	6. Life with Khlyen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content note: mentions of police violence.

Turin might have hoped that little scene would buy him no more Khlyen ever, but in fact it bought him less than 24 hours before Khlyen was once again appearing in his comms, at work and at home, at all times of the day and night, handing out implausible orders accompanied by gruesome threats. 

"If any harm comes to her, you will beg for death for a long, long time before I finally give it to you," was typical. 

"See, there's just one small problem with that," Turin said, wild-eyed and sarcastic. "You're the one who decided to make this kid a Killjoy. Level Five. Well congratulations, you got what you wanted, but guess what? Killjoying is not exactly a safe occupation. If you wanted her safe, you should have made her a, a database systems administrator. Or a librarian. Those are nice, safe jobs." 

"Stop talking," said Khlyen. 

"Or a dental assistant, I've heard they make decent money..." Turin mused. 

"If you don't stop talking..." Khlyen began. 

"Right, shutting up," Turin said. "I like my vocal cords where they are. Sir." 

On another occasion Khlyen announced, out of nowhere, his voice full of disgust: "Yalena has just completed a Level Two warrant for disorderly behaviour, as part of three-person team that also included Joe Cyano and John Jacobis. They did not even use physical force to apprehend the criminal. They merely spoke to him and verbally convinced him to surrender himself into their custody." 

"That's good," Turin said, knowing it was futile to talk sense to the man, but unable to stop himself from trying. "It's better to avoid violence where possible. They did a good job." 

"Level 2 is not good enough," Khlyen said, "Cyano and Jacobis are holding Yalena back. She has special training and she needs opportunities to make use of her unique skills." 

"Yes," Turin agreed, "but she's been a RAC agent for just a few days now. She's not ready for Level Five, whatever her official rank." 

Khlyen insisted: "She is ready. She's been ready since she was ten." 

Turin suppressed a shudder at that, and explained: "It's not just about training, it's about real life experience. Most RAC agents don't join right out of school, they go somewhere else first. That could be the Company Security Forces or it could be the army, doesn't matter which army, we aren't picky, it could be private security or one of the better militias, or civil police if the person comes from one of the parts of the J that has non-militarised police forces, that's not how we do things here in the Quad but I don't judge, we've taken sheriff's deputies, rangers, bounty hunters and privateers, and there are those academies in other parts of the J, the point is, people come to us from somewhere else. They come to us hardened and tested, they come to us already knowing how to handle a weapon, how to work in a team, how to adapt and make decisions on the ground. So I don't care what kind of fancy education Yardeen had, by RAC standards she's not ready, she's new and inexperienced and she is doing exactly the right thing by taking Level 1 and Level 2 warrants while she builds up some experience." 

"Are you done?" Khlyen asked icily. 

"No I'm not done," Turin retorted. "Yardeen is barely more than a kid. She and Jacobis shouldn't have been let into the RAC at all, but since they're in, they're going to have to fill a hell of a lot of shitty Level 1 and Level 2 warrants to make up for that. Now I'm done." 

"You are talking about ordinary people," Khlyen replied, unmoved. "None of this applies to Yalena. She's special." 

"She doesn't want to kill anyone," Turin said, playing the last card he had. In one of his infrequent text-only messages Joe had passed on the news that Yardeen was some kind of pacifist now, apparently. 

"She always says that," Khlyen replied, waving his hand dismissively, "but in the end, she always does what's required." 

"Then just be a little more patient. You say she always comes around in the end. So give her time to come around." 

"Unfortunately time is a luxury which may be in short supply. My patience wears thin, Turin. See to it that the intensity of her work increases immediately and markedly. If it does not, I will destroy this pathetically unsuitable mentor, Joe Cyano, and then I will come for you." 

The console screen flicked back to its usual display. 

Turin stared at it for a few moments, then mentally shrugged and sent a short message to Joe telling him to get Yardeen do a Level 3 warrant, even though Turin was pretty sure Joe wasn't even bothering to read his messages anymore. Turin didn't blame him. Those messages were just a stream of impossible demands passed on from Khlyen. 

There was nothing he could do. He had to do something. 

He needed to talk to Joe, face to face. 

Technically Turin could make Joe come and talk to him anytime he wanted to, just call him in officially to the RAC. But that would lead to things being official and on the record, which Turin didn't want. 

Anyway if Joe was summoned officially he might not come, which would count as insubordination and would lead to bureaucratic hassle. Joe was the highest-performing Killjoy Turin had, but also the hardest one to control, and he really only followed orders when he wanted to. Turin wouldn't let anyone else get away with acting like that, but Joe was, well, Joe. He was brilliant at his job and everyone owed him a favour or three, he was endlessly generous and always willing to help when it counted, but he did things his own way. 

So Turin needed an unofficial meeting, which meant Westerley and the Royale, which was fine. It was a hassle and Turin hated going there, but it was fine. He needed to talk to Bellus anyway. 

* * * 

The Royale was frequented by miners, seasonal agricultural workers, ruffians of various types, and Killjoys. It was a bar that doubled as a brothel, which Turin thought was a little tacky. Not that he had a problem with sexers, he visited them often enough, but he thought a bar should be a bar and a brothel should be a brothel. Separate. 

The bar downstairs was a big square open space with a bunch of tables and an empty area where musicians sometimes played. The tables were sticky, the beer tasted like it was watered down with muddy water and stale piss, and fights broke out often. For some reason Turin's Killjoys all loved the place, so he went there whenever he wanted to catch one of them for an unofficial face-to-face conversation. Turin hated it but, if he was being honest, it was a hatred tinged with fondness. 

He found Bellus and Big Joe sitting at a table together. Convenient. Turin put his game face on. 

"Bellus!" he greeted, pulling out a seat for himself, "let me buy you a drink and tell you about the sexy and above all lucrative world of RAC warrant brokerage."

Bellus smirked unpleasantly. "I'd rather talk about your new boyfriend, Khlyen," she said. "I hear he's a real piece of work."

For several moments Turin didn't move, react, or even blink.

After that overly-long pause he said casually: "Oh yeah? What did you hear?"

"Some high-up in Interstellar taking a personal interest in you? Don't be coy, everyone's talking about it."

Turin grimaced, then deliberately pulled his face back into a neutral expression while he struggled to think of a response.

"He's a real charmer alright," Turin said finally. "Likes to keep the lines of communication open at all times, day and night, which is delightful."

"That's good to hear," Bellus replied, smiling like a shark.

"Is that why you have that eye twitch thing now?" Joe asked.

"What?" Turin asked, baffled.

"Under your eye."

"What?" Turin said again. 

"Just - " Joe wiggled his fingers. "Under your eye, there's a thing. Never mind." 

"What thing?" Turin asked again.

"One of the little muscles in your face is spasming," Bellus said impatiently. "Stress thing. It'll probably go away if you stop grinding your teeth so much."

"I have no idea what you people are talking about," Turin said dismissively.

Bellus shot a look at Joe, who shrugged.

"Alright then," Bellus said, narrowing her eyes at Turin, "if you're not going to talk about your new boyfriend or your new facial tic, how about we talk about the bitch who shot Joe. You know the one I mean, Turin. You _made her a RAC agent_."

"Aw hells," Turin groaned, putting his palm to his forehead.

"Oh, we're doing this," Bellus replied. Her voice had gone low and dangerous.

"Bellus, look, everything is fine," Turin said. "Joe, tell her."

Bellus looked at Turin like he'd grown a second head.

"Is he okay?" she asked Joe.

"I've been wondering that myself," Joe replied.

"I'm sitting right here," Turin pointed out. "Joe, where are the little shits, anyway?" 

"They're nearby," Joe said vaguely, "I had to make them wait outside, they're not exactly welcome in this place at the moment. Turns out Pree has a policy that people who shoot me aren't allowed in the Royale." Joe shrugged. "I never knew he cared so much." 

Bellus gave a little huff of approval. "Well at least Pree hasn't gone stark raving mad." She shot a glare at Turin, then turned her gaze back on Joe. "Wait a minute. He's making you babysit the bitch that shot you?" 

Joe said: "It's a long story." 

"Well you'd better get story-telling," Bellus growled, "because I don't like not knowing what the hells is going on." 

Turin could feel his blood pressure skyrocketting, but Joe seemed unphased by Bellus's questions. 

"Well to start with, there's two of them," he said. "They're not so bad." 

"So they're not completely useless as Killjoys?" Turin asked hopefully. 

Joe shrugged again. "Not completely. One of them knows all about poisons and antidotes. And the other one is pretty good at hotwiring spaceships." 

"That sounds like two people who would be very good at committing crimes," Bellus said acidly, "not catching criminals." 

"Do they have to be mutually exclusive?" Joe asked with a pout. 

It was fairly widely known that, despite being a RAC agent, Big Joe had ties to Westerley's organised crime world. It was something Turin mostly tried not to think about. 

Bellus growled: "Cut the shit, Turin, they're practically teenagers. No way in hell either of them is cut out to be a RAC agent." 

"I was pretty young when I started," Joe said mildly. 

"You earned it," Bellus retorted. "They didn't." 

"Look, they're not teenagers, they're older than that," Turin said. He pushed his chair back and stood. "And this has been swell, but I have to go." In fact he'd only just arrived, but he'd been there long enough to realize that coming to the Royale had been a terrible mistake. A disaster. The place was a seething pit of questions he didn't want to answer. 

Bellus stood as well and stepped up to Turin, glaring fiercely. It dawned on him that he was about to get punched. 

It wasn't like he didn't deserve it. Turin would want to punch himself too, if he was Bellus. Maybe if she hit him hard enough he'd pass out and then he'd finally be able to get some sleep. Unfortunately it looked like she was going for the gut though, not the head. 

Turin sucked in his abdominal muscles and waited. 

Joe stood as well, his eyes flicking between them. 

"I need a favour from both of you," Bellus said. 

The two men looked at her warily. 

"It's about O'wyn," she added. 

"O'wyn your... husband?" Joe clarified. 

"That's the one. He's been on at me to introduce him to my colleagues, wants to get to know you for some reason. Long story short, he's having a dinner party. We are. He wants you both to come." Bellus rolled her eyes and gave a helpless little shrug, as if this was the most ridiculous thing a husband could possibly ask for. 

Turin opened his mouth and shut it without any sound coming out.

"When would O'wyn like us to come?" Joe asked politely.

"Day after tomorrow, seven o'clock sharp." Bellus turned on her heel and stalked out of the Royale without another word.

The two men watched her go, nonplussed.

When she was gone Joe said quietly: "That was weird, right?"

Turin turned on Joe and fixed him with a glare. "Now you listen to me," he said, "I don't have time to deal with this so you are going to have to deal with it."

"Deal with what?" Joe asked, "A dinner invitation?"

Turin hissed: _"You know what I mean!"_

"No, I really don't," Joe replied.

"Look," Turin explained, exasperated, "Bellus is one of us but O'wyn isn't, he's normal, he believes in all those politeness things and if you get a single thing wrong they will carry a grudge forever, which normally I wouldn't give two shits about but Bellus and O'wyn have been on the rocks for a while now and if he actually leaves her then - then I don't know what she'll do but it won't exactly be _cute_, so you and I are going to go to this thing and we are going to do whatever it takes to make O'wyn happy, but I don't have time to figure this out so _you are going to figure this out._" 

"Turin," Joe said slowly, "I have no idea what you just said." 

"I do," said a voice.

Turin and Joe both turned to see Prima Dezz, resplendant.

"Turin, you look like shit," Pree said, not without sympathy, "you're scaring away my customers. Go home. Joe and I will work together to make sure your dinner with Bellus and her husband goes magnificently." 

"We will?" Joe asked. 

"Of course we will," Pree said soothingly. 

"Oh thank the gods," said Turin, and he stomped out of the Royale like a toddler having a tantrum. 

Three seconds later he turned around and stomped back in, grabbed Joe by the upper arm and whisper-shouted at him: "Look, you have to make her do a Level 3, I know she's not ready, I don't care if you have to do the work yourself and just let her take the credit, just make her do a Level 3 within the next 48 hours, I'm not giving that bastard much but I have to give him something." 

Joe stared at Turin. He didn't even look annoyed anymore, he looked worried, which was worse. Turin let him go and made a hasty exit before anything else could happen. 

He wasn't even sure where he was going. Not to his ship, which was full of hidden surveillance and also, potentially, at any given time, Khlyen. His _ship_ had Klyen in it. _His ship._ The thought made him want to bite his own face off. 

Maybe he'd just find a bar where no-one knew him and drink until he passed out. 

"You were just humouring him, right?" Joe asked Pree, once Turin was gone. 

"Of course," Pree replied. 

"I mean, no offense, but I think I can handle a dinner party." 

"Of course." 

"I'm a Westerlyn, it doesn't mean I was raised by wolves." 

"Mm-hmm." Pree tilted his head to the side, contemplating. 

Joe chuckled. "Okay then. Glad we cleared that up." 

"Just bring him here to me with a little time to spare beforehand." 

"Excuse me?" 

"You said it yourself: it's about humouring him. Our little Gingersnap was always wound up a little tight, but lately something has been making him extra-extra-tense. If we tell him everything is fine, it'll only wind him up tighter than ever. So, humour him. Bring him to me, I'll critique both your outfits and lecture you both on guest etiquette. It'll be like a little military briefing for him. Just the thing to put his mind at ease and make him feel comfortable." 

"Do you even know anything about guest etiquette?" 

"Not the point, sweetie." 

"Fine. I mean, that's bonkers, but fine, I'll play along." 

"Honestly," Pree said, "with the things I do for you people sometimes, I really am an angel among bartenders." After a moment's thought he added: "I think I'll make him let me play with his hair. I deserve to get some amusement for myself in all this." 

* * * 

"Yalena is not showing any signs of progress," Khlyen said angrily, appearing unannounced as usual. Turin had been dozing in his office, slumped over his desk, his head propped on his arm. He startled into alertness. 

"Did you know she goes by 'Dutch' now?" he asked conversationally. "Won't let anyone call her Yalena." 

Khlyen ignored this and went off on one of his rants, muttering about warrants. 

"It's understandable, given that everyone knows who she really is," Turin went on cheerfully. "I mean, I know they tried to hush it up, but it's not easy to keep something like that secret." 

"Here, this one," Khlyen said, as a new warrant pinged on Turin's computer. "See that she takes it." 

"How?" Turin asked bluntly. "RAC agents above Level 1 choose their own warrants. She's Level 5! Of course, normally as commanding officer I could put on some pressure, but Yardeen doesn't even listen to me. That's what happens when someone gets a position handed to them instead of having to work their way up through the ranks like everyone else. They end up feeling like they don't have to listen to superior officers." 

"No, she doesn't listen to you, does she?" Khlyen mused, in that smooth voice of his that probably meant he was thinking about peeling the skin off Turin's face and eating it. "She doesn't even like you." 

"None of them like me," Turin snapped. "Yardeen doesn't bother trying to hide it." 

"Which makes you entirely useless to me," Khlyen said, "and that is a dangerous situation for you to find yourself in. However Yalena does seem to like this Joe Cyano, for some reason. She listens to him. Perhaps I should speak to him directly, despite his many shortcomings." 

"You don't need to talk to Cyano," Turin said quickly, "I'll have a discussion with him about having his team move to higher level warrants." 

"Level 5 warrants," Khlyen corrected him. "Soon, Turin. My patience wears thin." 

* * * 

Turin stormed into the Royale, scanned the room, scanned the room again, scowled, tapped something onto a handheld communications device and shouted into it: "Where are you? I thought you'd be at the Royale. I'm at the Royale. I need to talk to you. Please don't make me have come to Westerley again for nothing." 

"I'm at the noodle place just down the way," replied Joe. 

"With your little murder kids?" Turin guessed. 

"Don't call them that," Joe said. "You want directions? You just go out the alley and..." 

"No, you come here, I don't want to talk to them, I want to talk to you." 

"You're talking to me right now." 

"I don't want to talk over comms, get your ass over here now." 

"Okay, but I don't like leaving them alone for too long, they have a tendency to get into trouble." 

"Well, tell them to sit tight and behave or I'll shoot them both myself." 

"Fine. Be there in five." 

Joe arrived at the Royale a few minutes later and found Turin sitting alone at a small table, clenching his jaw and glaring at nothing. Joe sat down across from him and asked, in his most de-escalating tone of voice: "What can I help you with?" 

"Yalena needs warrants," Turin burst out, the words emerging like a river through the dam of his gritted teeth. "Nice clean safe tidy deadly Level 5 kill warrants. Pretty ones tied up with shiny little bows. Only the prettiest deadliest warrants for Yalena. You have to get her to kill someone. But safely. She has to hunt down and kill a dangerous criminal without tousling a single precious hair on her precious princess head." 

"Okay," Joe said evenly, "Dutch won't take a Level 5 warrant. She refuses to kill anyone." 

"Well, that doesn't make any sense," Turin said incredulously. "She's the Murder Princess of Kefferee, of course she wants to kill people. It's what she's here for, for crying out loud. She went from zero to five and skipped all the other numbers in between because all she wants to do is kill people!" 

"She doesn't," Joe insisted with a shrug. "She doesn't. Look, she doesn't know about all that Murder Princess stuff. That stuff, yeah, it's out there, you can find it if you know to look for it, but it doesn't show up on the main public channels. I didn't hear about it until Bellus told me." 

"Until Bellus told practically everyone in the Quad, you mean," Turin snapped. 

"The woman likes her celebrity gossip." Joe shrugged again. "The point is, we don't know the whole story, we just know what Bellus knows. And Dutch - I don't think she knows what Bellus knows. But I'm pretty sure Jacobis does, now. Something changed when they came back from Qresh. He's more protective of her than ever." 

"That's like a minnow being protective of a shark," Turin said in disgust. He gave a shake of his head that made his hair fall in front of his face, then tilted his chin up to shake it back again, annoyed. 

"Whatever. Jacobis is making sure Yardeen doesn't find out about the Murder Princess stuff. I think it would be better if no-one else mentions it to her, either, at least for a while." 

Turin ran a hand through his hair. "Is there are point to all this?" 

"The point is, she doesn't want to kill anyone, and I can't force her. She wants to do level ones and level twos, build up some experience before taking on higher-level warrants." 

"Well, that almost makes me want to like and respect her. Except, oh no wait, I don't, because she's a murdering bitch who ruined my life." 

"Look, Turin, I'm not saying she's innocent, but whatever happened to her on Kefferee, I don't think it was 100% her fault." 

"Goddammit, Khlyen wants her to kill as many people as possible as fast as possible. Won't shut up about it." 

"Why?" 

"As far as I can tell? Because he's a sociopath with a bizarre fixation on Yardeen." 

"Boss..." 

"Yeah, yeah, I know. This whole situation is crazy." 

"Actually I was going to ask if you're alright." 

"I'm peachy." 

"Alright then. Since I'm here there's something else I should mention, that you should try not to freak out about." 

"Well?" 

"Well, I took them both to the firing range to see what they're like." 

"And?" 

"And both of them can handle themselves with a weapon. Jacobis's father is a sheriff, apparently, taught the kid to shoot. And Yardeen claims she learned it as a hobby. I'm getting them both working a couple of times a week with a training AI, in a couple of months they should be up to the level they should have been when they started." 

"Well that's some good news." 

"It is. And I took them to the gym. Jacobis is okay. I mean, not great, but not hopeless either, mostly he just needs a lot of polishing, but the basic skills are there." 

"And Yardeen?" 

"Don't freak out. Yardeen is crazy good at close-range fighting. Not just hand-to-hand; knives, projectiles, improvised weapons, all of it. The kid's a weapon. Knows a lot of gross stuff it's illegal to teach civilians; joint locks, choke holds, compliance holds, all that." 

"'Compliance' is military slang for 'torture'," Turin muttered. 

"Look, whatever she was before, she's one of us now," Joe said, "so this is a good thing." 

"Is it?" Turin asked. "She may be a Killjoy now, but that doesn't mean we should trust her, and we sure as hell shouldn't _like_ her. Joe, she's manipulating you just like she's manipulating that kid Jacobis, making you think she's your friend. She's not your friend. Whatever creepy elite murder school she went to to learn all those creepy torture techniques, they probably taught her creepy emotional manipulation techniques, too. You need to be careful." 

"Sure," Joe said, sounding unconvinced. 

"Dammit Joe," Turin said. "He was right, you're not the right person to be her mentor, with your big stupid heart." 

"He?" Joe asked. "Also, what?" 

"I should have given her to Bellus," Turin mused. 

"Please don't do that," Joe said quickly. 

"I won't, don't worry, my life has enough mayhem in it. Just be careful." 

"I will," Joe promised. "But for the record, I don't think she's some master manipulator. Maybe she has some skills and maybe she's seen some things. And done some things. But she can still be a scared kid who doesn't really know what she's doing." 

"The Murder Princess of Kefferee," Turin said with a snort. "Sure." 

Joe looked away. 

Turin looked morosely into his drink. "You're right about one thing though," he said, "she's young. Too young. They both are. No-one wants to be locked and served by a 20-year-old, it's just embarassing." 

Joe pushed his chair back. "Boss, respectfully, you seem like you need to get more sleep or something, I don't know, but you look like shit." 

"Okay then," Turin said, not taking offense. He downed his drink. "Get Yardeen to do a Level 3 within the next 48 hours." 

"I already discussed it with them," Joe said, "we decided ones and twos only for the first few weeks at least." 

"I don't care what you decided," Turin replied sourly. "Make her do a Level 3, then I can tell that psycho she's making progress." 

"I can't make her," Joe protested, "and that wouldn't even make sense. They're doing good, you know, both of them. I can make halfway decent Killjoys out of them in half a year. I'm not throwing Level Threes at them yet, not when they're coming along just fine the way they are." 

"Khlyen-" Turin began, then he shook his head. "Never mind." 

"At Level Three the target is facing serious jail time," Joe said, "as you know perfectly well. People can get pretty violent when they're facing ten or 20 years in prison, things can get crazy. Do you want to deal with the fallout when one of them gets a bystander killed, or shoots the wrong person by mistake, or forgets to put their weapon on the lower setting and kills someone? It wouldn't even be their fault, it would be our fault for sending them into a situation they're not ready for yet." 

"You're right," Turin replied morosely. 

"Sure I'm right," Joe said. He smiled and gave Turin a little pat on the bicep. "Get some sleep, boss." 


	7. Fancy Lee's Noodle Bar

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content notes:  
\- Mention of abuse of prisoners by prison guards.  
\- Mention of sexual abuse and trafficking of children.

Fancy Lee's Noodle Bar wasn't really a bar. In fact it was barely even a building, since one of the exterior walls, the one that should have faced the street, was missing, replaced by a row of concrete-block pillars. An ancient canvas awning hung out over the street, sheltering long rows of slender metal tables that had once been capable of folding to be stored away, but had long since been made solid by rust. 

The interior was the kind of 'open plan' that results from someone taking a sledgehammer to all the non-load-bearing walls. At the back of the dimly lit interior, past the rows of tables and benches, soup bubbled away in huge cast iron cauldrons which for all anyone knew had been bubbling away ever since the early days of the Company's colonization of the Quad. 

No-one remembered where the name 'Fancy Lee' came from. The owner was a hard-eyed woman in her early forties named Monacca. She was tall, brown and slender, kept her hair in immaculate parallel rows of braids that traced her skull from forehead to nape, then fell free to her mid-back; always wore a battered leather vest and matching wrap-around leather apron, and carried herself with a straight-backed pride despite always being splattered with soup. 

It was early evening, with only a few customers slurping away in the big space. Big Joe, Dutch and John Jacobis sat in a row, with Dutch sitting between the two men. They talked quietly, their bowls of noodles and broth already eaten. 

Bellus came in and took the empty seat next to Big Joe, and Monacca put a bowl of noodles and a spoon down in front of her. Bellus looked at it, shrugged, slid a strip of joy across the table to Monacca, and started eating. It was good. 

"I can't believe you're working out of the noodle place," she said between slurps.

"We could meet in your spaceship," Joe suggested. 

"I'm not letting _those_ in my ship," Bellus said darkly, shooting a glare at Yardeen and Jacobis. "Why don't we meet in yours?"

From Joe's other side, Dutch rolled her eyes, while John wondered out loud why no-one on Westerley had any manners. 

"We could, but it's all the way down at the dry docks for repairs at the moment, it's a bit of a hike. And theirs is still impounded."

"I don't want to go to theirs. How long until your repairs are finished?"

"That depends on how soon I can raise the joy to pay for them."

Bellus rolled her eyes. "Hard to earn joy when you're babysitting miscreants instead of doing your actual job."

Dutch and John both looked some combination of angry and sheepish. 

"Kids," Joe began.

John fixed Joe with an angry, kohl-lined glare. Dutch cleared her throat. 

"Esteemed junior colleagues," Joe amended. "Could you give us some space?" 

Dutch heaved an exasperated sigh and John scraped his chair against the floor a lot harder than was necessary, but they stood and moved to another table at the far end of the restaurant without complaining. 

"They grow on you," Joe said, once the two were out of hearing distance. 

"They'd have to." Bellus took a slurp. "Good noodles," she noted. 

"They are. And Turin doesn't like it here, so I get to sit down and think without him breathing down my neck. He was always kind of twitchy, but the past couple days, I'm starting to worry. Not just about the actual problems, about Turin's, you know." He tapped the side of his forehead.

"I wouldn't worry," Bellus replied, "it's probably just insomnia." 

"Okay, but he's acting weird." 

"Insomnia does that," Bellus said, "I've seen it before, a person stops sleeping and within a few days they're a raving loony." 

"Naw," Joe replied, "I've gone weeks on just 2 or 3 hours a night before. You get so tired you wish you were dead, and so clumsy and stupid you could trip over your thumbs, but you don't go crazy." 

"I'm not talking about 2 or 3 hours sleep," Bellus clarified, "I'm talking about no sleep." 

"I've heard of stuff like that in prison," Joe said slowly, "if the guards really hate you they'll shine a light in your eyes every fifteen minutes, it's like torture - is someone doing something like that to Turin? What did he say?" 

"No, Joe," Bellus was annoyed now, "I don't mean someone's making him stay awake, I just mean his own brain is making him stay awake, it's a stress thing." 

"It can't be just stress," Joe said incredulously. "I'm stressed, everyone is stressed, it doesn't mean you don't sleep." 

"Except sometimes it does," Bellus shrugged. "Look, it'll work itself out sooner or later." 

Joe was still struggling with the concept. "When he falls asleep, you mean." 

"Yeah." 

"So how do we get him to sleep?" 

"Not our job, Cyano." Bellus pushed away her empty bowl and produced a portable comm tablet which she set down on the table in its place. "Now let's get down to business."

Bellus and Joe leaned over the comm tablet. 

"Okay, I don't like this," Joe said, several minutes later. "How do we know the tech stuff will even work?" 

"My guy will figure that part out." 

"Right, your guy." 

"He's on his way now." 

"And you trust him?" 

"Trust? I don't know about that, but he wants to get in my good books, and he knows his way around surveillance tech." 

"Even weird tech that probably comes from way outside the Quad? This stuff won't exactly be Company standard issue." 

"Should be right up my guy's alley then. Weird tech is his thing." 

Monacca took Bellus's empty bowl away and began aggressively wiping down the table, jostling Bellus's elbow as she did so. 

"Watch it," Bellus muttered. 

"Okay, time to go," Monacca said loudly.

They ignored her.

"Time to go," Monacca said again, even louder this time. 

"Look, we're kind of in the middle of something," Joe told her.

Monacca replied, unimpressed: "I'm about to have my rush, miners coming off shift, so get out." 

"Dammit," said Bellus. 

Joe said to Monacca: "Do you have a back room we could use for a few hours? We'll pay." 

"We will?" Bellus asked Joe. "We can just go to the Royale, Pree will get over it." 

"Yeah, and it'll be another half hour of hassle and making nice with Pree before we can hear ourselves think," Joe countered, "and it's not exactly private there. We're here now, and we need to get this done." He switched his attention from Bellus to Monacca, who stood in front of him, glaring, arms crossed. "So, how about that room?" 

Monacca pursed her lips, apparently making a decision, then abruptly she shouted so loudly that the other diners all looked up: "Mishna! Mishna, come down here right now!" 

There was a moment's silence, then a door banged, feet stomped down stairs, and a girl of about thirteen appeared. The girl was like a smaller copy of Monacca, right down to the hairstyle, but where Monacca held herself straight Mishna slouched, where Monacca's clothing fitted her perfectly everything Mishna wore looked a little too big, and Mishna's neatly braided rows came with a halo of frizzy strands that had escaped the braids. 

Mishna said: "Ma, I'm on the _last level_, I'll do chores as soon as I finish." 

Monacca said: "Come here."

Bellus was trying to catch Joe's eye, but Joe seemed unphased by this turn of events. 

Mishna went to stand next to her mother. Monacca said to the girl: "I know you want to go to that Nova thing in the summer." 

The kid's whole demeanor softened, and she replied quietly: "Ma, it's okay, I know we probably won't have the money this year." 

Monacca said: "These people need a room they can use as an office for a few hours."

Mishna replied uncertainly: "They do?"

Monacca said: "They're Killjoys, so they can afford to pay very well."

"Kind of," Joe muttered.

Monacca went on: "You could clear out your room, bring up a few of the extra chairs from the cellar, and let them have it from now until whenever they want to leave tonight. But it's your room, so it's your choice. And it would be your money to spend how you want."

Mishna's eyes lit up. "Yes! You can have my room! It won't take me two minutes to clear it out. I'll go clear it out right now!"

Monacca held out a hand. "Wait. You'll still have to do your homework."

"I can do it at Houmi's," Mishna replied quickly, "her family won't mind."

Monacca went on: "And you still need to do your chores tonight."

"I will, I promise," agreed Mishna.

Monacca added: "And you need to negotiate a price."

At this Mishna went quiet and looked at the ground. An impossibly pink blush rose across the girl's cheeks. 

Bellus said, annoyed: "We don't have time for this." 

"When the customer is in a hurry, the price goes up," Monacca announced to the whole room, with the air of a college lecturer. "They don't have have time to shop around for a better bargain so they're willing to pay more." 

Joe put in: "How about a hundred joy. We'll pay half now and half when we're finished." 

Bellus protested: "We could rent out a room at Pree's for less than that!"

"Yeah," Joe agreed, "but we're here now."

Mishna cast a glance at Monacca, who nodded. "I accept!" she said. "I'll go tidy my room. Wait, do we have to cut our hands to seal the deal?" 

"How about we just shake on it," Joe suggested, holding his hand out to the girl. Mishna shook it energetically, then rushed back up the stairs, along the corridor and into her room, where she stood looking around wildly. 

The room was small, with a desk and chair, bed, bedside table, some shelves and a big standing cupboard-wardrobe instead of a closet. Every surface was covered in a messy layer of clothing, shoes, sports equipments, broken and half-repaired consoles and speakers, and a half-constructed scrap drone flyer. After scanning the room for several moments she kicked some dirty laundry along the floor until it was mostly hidden under the bed. Next she scooped up a pile of schoolwork and other debris from the desk's surface, set it down on the floor next to the bed, and set about nudging at with with her feet in an attempt to get it to go underneath, but the stuff bumped up against other stuff that was already under there and wouldn't budge. 

"You're super gonna regret that later," said a voice. John Jacobis stood in the doorway, leaning against one side of the door frame. 

"You don't need to lecture me about my room being a mess," Mishna replied, "my Ma already does that, trust me." 

"Okay," the young man said, "but if you want my suggestion: get some crates or bags or something. Then put all the stuff from the desk in one crate and all the stuff on the bed in another crate. Keep all your messes segregated from each-other. That way even if you move the messes around, you don't make it any worse overall than it was before." 

The kid brightened. "That's a good idea." 

"Of course it is," John said with a smirk, "it's my idea." 

Mishna fetched some crates and the two of them packed her things away, fetched chairs, and pulled Mishna's desk away from the wall so that a group of people could sit around it. 

"Do you want some water? I'll get water and glasses," Mishna babbled happily, "if you want anything from my Ma you better ask now, because once the rush starts and she starts serving, she won't help you, even if your hair catches on fire she won't care." 

"I guess I'll try not to set anyone's hair on fire then," John replied, earning an eye-roll and a one-sided grin from Mishna. 

The kid disappeared and returned to thunk down a pitcher of water and a stack of copper cups on the desk a minute later. 

John said: "So, Nova Cadets. Pretty cool."

Mishna looked at him as if he had suddenly become interesting. "You were in Nova Cadets?"

John replied: "Nah, I was too bad, so I couldn't go. My brother D'avin went though. Said it was the most fun he ever had in his life.

Mishna said thoughtfully: "So... they have Nova Cadets where you come from, too?"

John asked: "How do you know I'm not from Oldtown?"

Mishna gave a little laugh and looked at the floor, embarassed. "Um, you're definitely not from Oldtown." 

"It's that obvious, huh?" 

"Yeah." 

"Well you're right, I come from a place called Telen, and they have Nova Cadets there too. I think there's Nova Cadets everywhere in the J." 

"Why did you come to Westerley?" Mishna asked, and then she answered her own question: "it's because you like my Ma's noodle soup right? I've seen you and those Killjoys here a couple of times."

"It is very fine soup," said John.

Bellus and Joe came into the room. 

"Get out," Bellus said. 

"Get out, please," Joe amended. "And thank you again for the room, Mishna." 

"You're welcome," Mishna said cheerfully. "I got you water. If you want anything else, don't bother asking, because no-one will care." 

Bellus laugh-snorted at that. 

"You too," Joe added, to John. "Bellus and I need some private time." 

"Ew," said Mishna, who had exited the room and was now standing in the hallway just outside. 

"Not that kind of private time," said Joe. 

"What are me and Dutch supposed to do?" John asked. 

"Wait outside." 

"Okay, but I don't think Monacca will like us loitering out there," John said. 

"She really won't," put in Mishna. 

"Surveil the alley," Joe commanded, "discretely. It'll be good Killjoy practice. Take Dutch with you. No whining. And you, Mishna, right? Don't you need to get your homework stuff together and go to your friend's house? What was her name?" 

"Houmi," said Mishna. 

"You'd better go right now, you don't want to leave it too late. Do you have all the stuff you need? I don't want you coming back in later to get your stuff." 

"I won't," Mishna said, offended. 

"Get going then." 

"I _am_ going." 

"John, you and Dutch walk her to her friend's house then come straight back and surveil the alley. Don't do anything else. No complaining, just do what I said," instructed Joe. 

"Fine," John replied. 

"And if you see Bellus's guy, send him up to us. Bellus, what does your guy look like?" 

"Long hair, bad attitude, trust me you won't miss him. Don't talk to him, he's dangerous, just send him up." 

John and Mishna exited, leaving Bellus and Joe alone in the room. There were footsteps on stairs, and Mishna's voice floated up clearly, saying: "Wow, those guys are jerks," with John replying: "I know, right?" 

Joe and Bellus picked up their earlier discussion. 

"So, this guy's courting you? Is he any good?" 

Bellus snorted. "Yeah, he's good." 

There were two ways to become a RAC agent, if your name wasn't Yalena Yardeen. One was to enter one of the RAC's training academies, but those were located in distant regions of the J; there were no RAC academies anywhere near the Quad. 

The other way in was mentorship. A would-be Killjoy had to find an experienced mentor, a Level 4 or 5 Killjoy with at least five years' service in good standing, willing to sponsor them, train them, and take them on as a junior partner for at least six months. 

Mentorship was potentially a huge hassle for the mentor. During the apprenticeship period the mentor was held responsible for any mistakes the apprentice made; if the mistakes were serious the mentor would be disciplined harshly, while the apprentice would be expelled from the RAC forever. The RAC did pay a stipend to mentors, since they were expected to act as trainers on top of doing their usual job, but it wasn't much. All this meant that Killjoys tended to be extremely reluctant to take apprentices. That worked out fine for the RAC. Turnover was low - it was rare for anyone to quit the RAC, Killjoys tended to keep Killjoying until death or, in a few lucky cases, promotion or retirement - so only a few new apprentices per year were needed. 

More often than not, apprentices were a family member or close friend to their mentor, sometimes an old army comrade who was already known and trusted, or someone to whom the mentor owed a large favour. 

If a prospective RAC agent lacked a friendship or family connection, they might pick a Killjoy they wanted as a mentor and bring that Killjoy gifts, do them favours, obey their every whim, and essentially become an unofficial, unpaid apprentice in the hopes of one day being allowed to become an official one. 

This unofficial method of RAC entrance had a low success rate, to put it mildly, but that didn't stop people from trying. 

"Why does he want to be a Killjoy?" Joe asked. 

"As far as I can tell, all he cares about in life is building his own custom trackers and projectiles," Bellus replied. "His favourite tech ingredients are mostly not on the Company's approved list, but they'd be legal if he could order them in through the RAC." 

"So, weirdo with a fetish for restricted tech," Joe summarized. "Sounds like he'd fit in pretty well around here. And he won't tell you his name?" 

"Everytime I asked he said something different, so I stopped asking." 

"So he's a weirdo asshole. Never heard of you having a suitor before. Is he making himself useful?" 

Bellus replied indignantly: "What do you take me for? I'm not like you, I don't pick up strays, and I don't keep apprentices around unless they make it worth my while. Of course he's making himself useful. He'll make a better-than-average Killjoy once I get tired of keeping him around as my own personal minion." 

"So you're going to sponsor him?" 

"Well, I wouldn't go that far." 

"Doesn't sound fair." 

Bellus scoffed: "Relax, Cyano. I don't want to be his mentor because I don't like responsibility, but someone will. I'm just breaking him in first." 

"Not everyone who wants a mentor gets one. You could be breaking his heart." 

"Naw, I told you, my guy's good. You know most of these wannabe Killjoys are useless. My guy - he can fight, pilot, follow complicated instructions, gets things done without asking a lot of stupid questions. Never talks about his feelings. I'm not even sure he has feelings, he might be a robot under all that hair. Killjoys will be falling over themselves to have a junior partner like that. I should hold an auction!" Bellus grinned. "Unless you want him, Cyano, I'd give you dibs." 

"I have enough on my plate, thanks. Also I prefer the ones with actual human emotions." Joe rubbed the back of his neck. "All this still doesn't solve the real problem. If Dutch doesn't take a Level 5 warrant and kill someone soon, something is going to happen to Turin, I don't even know what, but something." 

"Do you know who it is that's been leaning on him?" Bellus asked. "Is it this Interstellar bigwig Khlyen I've been hearing about?" 

"I don't know." 

"It probably is," Bellus said thoughtfully. "Well, whoever it is, do they want the girl to fill a Level 5 warrant, or do they just want her to kill someone? Because those are two different things." 

Joe threw up his hands. "Hells if I know." 

"Tell me again why she can't just do what he wants? You said she has the skills for it." 

"She doesn't want to." 

"So make her." 

"How? It's not a normal apprenticeship, I can't exactly kick her out of the RAC." 

"But she doesn't know that, right? Threaten to kick her out unless she does what she's told." 

"No! Bellus, I'm not making a 20-year-old kill people when she doesn't want to!" 

"She turned her husband into something that looked like chunky tomato soup! What's the problem? Don't look at me like that, you and I both know you started in this game at about that age, you killed more than your share, and you never whined about it!" 

"Yeah, fuck you, Bellus." 

"Oh Trees, did I hurt your feelings now?" Bellus heaved a sigh. "Fine. So it's not that she can't, it's just that she won't. She doesn't want to be the Red Bride of Kefferee anymore, she wants to be nice and normal, am I right?" 

"Don't talk about that Red Bride of Kefferee stuff," Joe said. "We don't even know if it's true or not." 

"Whatever. So she wants to be a good person, we can work with that. Now, this psycho Khlyen, he's been on Turin's ass to get her doing Level 5 warrants, but it might be he'd settle for any old random bit of killing if we offered it up to him." 

"Okay?" 

"Hmmm," Bellus hummed. She took back her tablet and spent a few minutes flicking back and forth between bits of information. "This one is probably... yup, got him. Here. This." She shoved the device at Joe. 

Joe looked at it. "A Level 1 warrant?" 

"It's perfect," said Bellus. 

Joe looked at it again. "It's a Level 1 warrant for non-payment of a fine. The fine was for a land-vehicle traffic violation within Oldtown. This isn't worth anyone's time." 

"It's not about the warrant," Bellus said with a wave of her hand. 

"Well, don't let Turin hear you talking like that." 

Bellus chuckled darkly. "Oh, I think we can agree Turin doesn't need to hear about a lot of things. But look, she needs to kill someone, for whatever bizarre sick reasons with that psycho Khlyen, I don't care, it's not my business. But trust me: if she takes this warrant, she'll kill someone. Probably several people. At the very least she'll work someone over a bit. That's what makes it perfect. Call her in." 

Joe hesitated. "Bellus..." he began, and trailed off because he didn't know what he was trying to say. 

"What? Call her." 

"Bellus," Joe said slowly, "before we do something rash, we should just take a step back." 

Bellus narrowed her eyes. Then she went to the window, pushed it open, and called out: "Hey little princess, get your ass in here now!" 

"Shit," Joe murmurred, mostly to himself. 

A few moments later there were footsteps on stairs, and Dutch entered with murder in her eyes. "Call me 'princess' again..." she began, coldly furious. 

Bellus met the young woman's murderous glare with one of her own. "And you'll do what, exactly?" 

The two women glared at each-other. Bellus said conversationally to Joe: "Well she knows how to stare a person down, that's something." Abruptly she snatched the tablet up from the table and shoved it at Dutch. "Take this warrant." 

Dutch cast a glance at Joe. 

"Don't look at him," Bellus snapped. "You're Level Five, you take your own warrants." 

Dutch took the tablet from Bellus, looked at it, and put it down again. "This is a shit warrant," she said coldly. 

"It's an easy one, it'll be good practice for you. You need to start working independently instead of tagging along with Joe all the time." 

"I've been a Killjoy for _five days_," Dutch said angrily. 

"Yes, and if you ever want to be worthy of the position that got handed to you, you need to start pulling your weight, little girl." 

_"Handed to me?"_

From behind Dutch's shoulder Joe was shaking his head and making cut-it-out motions of his fingers across his neck. 

"Sure," Bellus said, with a big shark-like smile, "some bureaucratic thing, if your combat skills test out past a certain level you get automatically put in at the top of the scale. Or something like that, I don't know, I don't make the rules. So I guess you must have some moves, girlie, but it takes more than pretty fighting techniques to make a halfway decent Killjoy, and so far, you and your little boyfriend have been nothing but a burden on Big Joe here. He's probably got you thinking he's a real hard man, but he's a soft-hearted idiot. Which is why he took you on, and it's also why he probably didn't tell you that since you two showed up in the Quad, he's been too busy wiping your little asses for you to take care of his own business. Killjoying is a business, did they tell you that? It's not all about chasing bad guys and having adventures. It's about keeping fuel in the tanks and paying the debts that need to be paid." 

Dutch's gaze flicked to Joe again. He looked mortified. 

Bellus eyed Dutch up and down. "You really do look young," she said, abruptly changing the subject. "You could be his type." 

"Bellus," Joe said, voice low and deeply unhappy, "she doesn't look young, she's just young." 

"For this job she needs to look even younger," Bellus said decisively. "Wash off all the make-up, mess your hair up a bit and then put it in a loose pony tail. Change the boots for flat shoes if you have them. You'll find him at this address, it's a shared house, not a family, it's him and a bunch of his friends who are all just as charming as he is. You march yourself right up to the front door and ask for him by name. Say you need money and someone told you he could help you." 

"I'd be undercover as a sexer," Dutch surmised. 

"Not as a sexer," Bellus said. 

"You just said I'm his type." 

"Sexers aren't his type. He likes scared little runaways. Try to look younger than you are. Tell him your parents kicked you out and you have no place to go. Make sure you say there's no-one looking for you, no-one who will care what happens to you. He'll let you in." 

Joe's face had gone ashen. "Bellus..." he whispered. 

"I'll do it," Dutch said, reaching again for the pad. 

"But I didn't even get to the fun part!" Bellus said with a grin. "Here's the fun part: if you look at this address, you'll notice it's in one of the parts of Oldtown where the Company Police don't like to go. So whatever happens while you're there, you won't need to worry about any authorities getting involved. You lay hands on your man, lock and serve, and make sure you bring him in alive. But I don't think anyone will care much about the exact state of his health. Or his charming friends. Oh and one final thing: while you're there you may find some small expensive items that are easily portable, probably won't be much, but whatever you find you gather it up and gift it to Big Joe here and with any luck it'll be enough to put some fuel in his damn ship again." 

Dutch accepted all of that with a hard-eyed nod. "And why do you care so much about Joe?" she asked Bellus. "You say he has a soft heart, but you don't, do you?" 

Bellus's grin widened. "Debt," she said simply. 

"What kind of debt?" 

"The kind that can't ever be paid in full. Now don't you have some things you need to go and do?" 

Dutch clasped Joe's arm, looked the man in the eye and promised: "I'll be fine. I'll see you later." 

"Take John with you," Joe said. "I mean, not with you with you, but..." 

"I know what you mean," Dutch replied, "and I will. He'd never forgive me if I tried something like this without back-up." 

"Not sure I would either, kid," Joe replied softly. 

Once Dutch was gone, Bellus leaned back in her chair and heaved a self-contented sigh. "With any luck she'll kill 2, 3, maybe 4 people, as well as injuring the one she'll have to take alive," she said cheerfully, "and then we'll see if that's enough to satisfy this Khlyen or whoever it is. If not, at least then we'll know more than we do now. It could be he's the kind of psycho that will never be satisfied, but if that's the case, we'll deal with that too. At least now we have a place to start. We're going to crack this, you mark my words. It may take some time, but we are going to solve the shit out of this pile of shit." 

Meanwhile, back down in the alley, a man with long hair and a grim expression came striding toward the noodle bar and John Jacobis stepped out of the shadows to greet him. 

"Hi," John said, "I'm John Jacobis. You must be Bellus's friend." 

The man shoved John out of the way and pushed past him without slowing his pace, grunting: "Out of my way, tourist." He strode into the noodle bar, where Monacca took one look at him and pointed to the staircase without bothering to try to serve him any soup at all. 

"So rude," John muttered, with a shake of his head. 


	8. Getting ready for dinner

Turin didn't bother going in to work, and instead sent in a message that he was taking a day off for illness. He wasn't really sick, but he hadn't been able to sleep for a few nights in a row now. He would lie in bed, so tired he wanted to cry, trying with increasing desperation to slow his breathing, calm his thoughts, relax every muscle in his body one at a time. After an hour or two of this he'd get up, eat some food, watch a video, pace around for a while, then get back into bed so the excruciating process could begin again. 

It was starting to affect his ability to focus. He spent the morning in a haze; at one point he went into his ship's kitchen intending to drink some coffee and eat a ration bar, then it was half an hour later and he was still standing there, the coffee cold and slowly dribbling down his arm because he was holding it at the wrong angle, the ration bar in his other hand, its wrapper still unopened. 

Probably he'd get some sleep tonight and then by tomorrow everything would be back to normal. Nothing to worry about. It didn't do any harm to take a day off, anyway. He had other things to think about. 

Since it was a day off he got his ship's AI to read him the news. There was a story that made him smile, about some vigilantes who had apparently wiped out a small-time human trafficking operation that had been running between Oldtown and the Salt Plains. Not that Turin approved of vigilantes, but it was nice to see the bad guys doing something good for once. Probably just a turf war gone wrong, but still. No doubt Oonam would have to send his people looking for the perpetrators for appearances' sake, but Turin doubted they'd try very hard to find those responsible. 

He took a long shower, came out wearing a towel around his hips and another around his head, went into his bunk and caught sight of Khlyen's face in the extra-large console screen he usually only used for playing entertainment videos. 

"Ah," Khlyen, the monster, said. 

"Gah-uh!" was the noise Turin's body emitted more or less without his permission. Making sure the towels remained in place he went to the closet at a fast shuffle, quickly and awkwardly snatched up the first shirt and trousers he could reach, and stormed back into the shower room without another word. There he threw the towels onto the floor instead of into the hamper where they belonged, put the shirt on, realised he'd forgotten underwear but damned if he was going to go back for them, pulled his still-damp limbs uncomfortably into the trousers, stormed back into his bunk and shouted at the screen: "Can I help you?" 

"I noticed you didn't go in to work," Khlyen said mildly, "so I thought I'd try you at home." 

Turin had no idea how to respond to that. He settled for staring angrily at the screen. 

"Are you ill?" Khlyen asked, in that creepily calm-and-friendly tone. "Your notice to Human Resources indicated you were taking an illness day, but it didn't specify the illness." 

"What do you want?" Turin asked, seething. "Yardeen's fine." 

"Yes, I'm very pleased with your progress with her," Khlyen said, with the encouraging yet patronising air of a teacher handing out a B grade to a C student. 

"You are," Turin said, because the monster in the video screen seemed to expect him to make some response. 

"I know Yalena is not always easy to work with," Khlyen went on. "I was very pleased to see her making use of her unique abilities." 

"They're unique, alright," Turin muttered. 

"Of course the circumstances were unconventional, but still, it's a start. You did well, Turin." 

Turin's brain clicked into gear. "Thank you sir," he said, "but I can't take all the credit, it's really Joe Cyano who encouraged her to use her abilities. Her unique abilities. She listens to him, views him as a friend. He's the only one who can get her to use her abilities, to be honest. So it's a good thing he's there." 

"That is a good thing, isn't it?" Khlyen replied drily. "Perhaps I'll be able to take a step back from our interactions in future, that might be salubrious for us both. So long as Yalena remains on the right path." 

The screen flicked off. 

"Salubrious," Turin muttered. 

His clothes were the wrong clothes. The shirt wasn't the one he wanted to wear today and his cock and balls were crammed into the trousers the wrong way and everything was slightly damp. He couldn't go in to the RAC like this. Not that he was going in, but. He didn't even want to walk around his ship like this. He stripped everything off, cursing, threw it all in the dirty clothes hamper, and went to take another shower. 

He somehow fell asleep in the shower, and then it was mid-afternoon. Turin instructed his ship's AI to limit showers to twenty minutes in future, dried and dressed himself, had more coffee and another protein bar. 

His ship's AI announced: "There is an incomming call from Prima Dezz, marked 'social'." 

"That's nice," said Turin, "asking to call, not just barging in. Accept." 

Prima Dezz appeared on the screen. 

"Gingersnap," Pree greeted. "Have you been getting enough sleep? You look... well, never mind. We need to talk about what you're wearing tonight. Is now a good time?" 

"Sure," said Turin. "What should I wear?" 

"Well, I need to see your wardrobe," Pree replied, "can you use a handheld comm to let me take a peek inside your closet?" 

"Sure, why not." 

A minute later Turin was standing in front of his closet, holding a comm facing outwards, and Pree was complaining. 

"Turin," Pree said disdainfully, "this isn't a closet. This is just shelving. Where do you keep your things hanging up?" 

"I don't," Turin said. "Do you mean a dress uniform? Wouldn't that be too formal?" 

"Oh, Trees," Pree said with a roll of his eyes, "I can't see anything. You need to get a light in here. How do you choose outfits?" 

"I never really thought about it," Turin replied honestly. 

"It's all black, isn't it?" Pree said despairingly. "That's why you don't have to match up your outfits - it's because all your clothes are the same color. I can't see, but I can just tell." The bar owner sighed dramatically. 

"I think some of them are more of a charcoal grey," Turin replied cheerfully. He didn't bother to mention that he had some white and grey t-shirts. It was oddly enjoyable, getting browbeaten by Pree like this. 

"Well, pick out something you think would work and lay it out on the bed so I can see it." 

"Alright." Turin picked out a shirt and pair of trousers at random to lay out on the bed. 

"Hmm," Pree mused. "The pants look alright, though I'd have to see you in them. The shirt is too boring. Put that one on the reject pile, pick out three more for me, and make sure all of them have a nice collar or an interesting pattern or stitching or some other feature, any feature at all, really." 

"Alright, hang on." 

They argued about shirts for a while, then about Turin's jacket. 

"Don't you have anything less... military?" Pree asked. 

"What do you mean, military? It isn't military. It isn't camouflage, it has no badges or insignias of any kind. It's just a jacket." 

"Oh, I know," Pree fussed, "it's just that it looks a bit... tactical." 

"Tactical? You mean, because it has pockets?" 

"Yes, exactly. I know what you're going to say. Small pockets are acceptable. But those pockets are too big and there are too many of them. You look like either a fisherman or a soldier or some kind of wacko militia survivalist type. None of which are acceptable for dinner." 

"Nothing wrong with being a fisherman. Or a soldier." Turin was smiling. 

"Please," Pree sniffed, "fish should come out of cans, not out of the sea. It's unsanitary. Well, alright. Show me your boots." 

Turin's boots were black, recently polished, and spotless; even Pree couldn't find anything to complain about there. 

Pree ended the conversation, saying he had some business to take care of but would call back later, and true to his word he called again in a couple of hours, as Turin was travelling from the RAC station to Westerley. This time he wanted to quiz Turin on proper guest behaviour. 

"Compliments are very important," lectured Pree. "As soon as you go inside you should say: 'You have a lovely home.' Unless it's a shithole, then don't say anything." 

"Okay," Turin agreed. 

"And when you start eating the food, say: 'This is delicious'. And if there are any children under ten, say they're very cute." 

"There won't be any kids." 

"Well, just in case. Now let's review. What do you say about the home?" 

"You have a lovely home." 

"Good. What do you say about the food?" 

"It's delicious." 

"And if there are small children?" 

"I say the little snots are just adorable." 

"Perfect. And what do you do if you find a big ugly insect in your salad?" 

"Throw up?" 

"Say nothing. Hide it under the lettuce leaves and eat around it." 

"Wait a minute, is the insect alive or dead in this scenario?" 

"Moving on. You'll need to make conversation. What are some acceptable conversation topics for dinner?" 

"How the hells should I know?" 

"The weather..." 

"I live in a spaceship and work on a space station." 

"Recent stories in the news, hobbies, music, celebrities, sports. And what are the forbidden topics?" 

"I don't know, anything gross? Like the huge insect that would be crawling across my plate." 

"Correct, gross insects are not acceptable conversation topics. Also: politics, economics, war, violence, death, and sex." 

"Okay then." 

"You need to bring a bottle of hokk as a gift, and selecting the right hokk is very important. If it's too good it'll seem like a power move, like you think you're better than they are. And if it's too cheap, well, then it's just cheap." 

"I have to go shopping for hokk? Why didn't you tell me this earlier?" 

"Relax, I'm choosing it for you and I'll send it with Joe, I'll put it on your tab." 

"Thanks, Pree." 

Meanwhile at the Royale, Joe sat at the bar across from Pree, listening. He waited for Pree to finish his call, then asked: "I'm bringing hokk?" 

Bellus, seated next to Joe, waved this off and said: "We still need to get him to let us on his ship." 

"Honestly, do I have to figure out everything for you people?" Pree asked. "Tell him something is wrong with your home, it flooded or something like that, so dinner is moved to your ship. You dock at Westerley Main, right? So then it will make sense for Joe to go to the docks and meet Turin at his ship, so they can walk together to yours." 

"That still doesn't get me in," Joe mused, "but I could say I need to use the toilet or something." 

"Perfect," Pree agreed. 

Turin arrived at Westerley Main Space Docks a short time later. He had a bit of time to spare before he was due to visit Bellus and O'wyn, so he was pottering around his ship when the AI alerted him that Joe Cyano was requesting entrance. 

"Open," Turin commanded, and he went down through his cargo bay to see the hatch open and the ramp go down. Waiting outside were Bellus, Big Joe and another man. Joe held a bottle. 

"I wasn't expecting all of you to come and meet me," Turin said with a smile as he walked down the ramp. At the bottom he reached to shake the strange man's hand, then stopped, confused. "You're not O'wyn," he said. "What's going on? Are we still going to dinner?" 

"There is no dinner," Bellus replied. "Shoot him with the sedative dart." 

_"What?"_ Turin barked, as the unknown man aimed the small cylinder he was holding and Turin felt a little bloom of pain in his neck. "Aw, shit," he added. 

"Get him," Bellus said. "I don't want head injuries. Or any injuries." 

The strange man stepped up close to Turin, wrapped an arm snugly around his back, and with his other hand clasped Turin's wrist. 

"You wanna tell me what the hells you're doing?" Turin asked woozily. 

"It's a fast-acting sedative," the man explained. "One more minute and you're going to - yep." 

Turin slumped over into the strange man's embrace. 

"Check his breathing," Bellus said. 

"Breathing's fine," the man replied. 

"Good. Carry him." 

The strange man slung Turin easily across his back, hunching forward to take the weight. Turin was still conscious, but he found he didn't mind being carried this way. Even though he was more or less upside-down, blood pooling to his head, bouncing and jostling with every step the man took up the ramp. He felt quite comfy. Comfy and floaty. He thought perhaps he could even fall asleep, like this. 

"Who's O'wyn?" the man asked conversationally. 


	9. Kidnapped!

Turin slept. 

He awoke blearily, feeling that he'd slept too long and yet not long enough to be fully rested. Threads of dreams still mixed with his somewhat-waking thoughts. He wanted to sleep longer, to give his consciousness time to untangle itself naturally, but a voice in his gut screamed that something was wrong, wrong, wrong, that he needed to wake up and deal with it right fucking now, before it killed him, whatever it was. 

He was in bed, the covers pulled up over him, all warm and cozy. But he hurt. Everything hurt. His head. His shoulders. His jaw. Dammit, had he really been grinding down that hard on his jaw, these past few days? Yeah, he really had. 

He opened his eyelids a crack and flicked his gaze furiously back and forth. It seemed he was in his own bed, on his ship? He shifted a bit, hoping it would seem to anyone watching like the kind of movement someone would make in their sleep, and nudged the covers back. He was in his own bed, alone in his bunk room. The door was shut. He sat up, pushing the covers away and going for the weapon at his hip, but his hip holster was empty. Disturbing. He scrabbled at the space between his mattress and head board and retrieved the weapon he kept stashed there for emergencies, checked it and stood up, scanning the room. 

His favourite gun, the one that should have been in his holster, lay on a side table in plain view. He was alone in the room, still wearing the same clothes he'd had on earlier. 

Turin went to the table and snatched up his favourite side-arm, checked it, and swapped it out for the other one. Then he looked at the extra weapon on the table, shrugged mentally, retrieved a thigh holster from the closet and strapped it on so he could carry that one too. It was feeling like a two-guns kind of day. 

What in all hells had got into Bellus? She'd lured him off his ship and had her pet thug shoot him with a poisoned dart, only to... carry him back onto his ship and put him away in his own bed? Who did that? It didn't make any kind of sense. Which was infuriating. If people were going to go crazy and commit assault against a superior officer, they should at least do it in a way that made some kind of sense. Like straight-up murder, or kidnapping for ransom or something like that. Something _logical_. 

Bellus and her pet thug hadn't hurt him, as far as he could tell. Not that he wasn't in pain, because dammit, everything hurt. Glowing, throbbing, electric cords of pain ran from his temples to the inner corners of his eyes, then ran down through his sinuses. His shoulders were a mass of pain. His pectoral muscles. Were you even supposed to be able to carry tension in your chest muscles? Turin could, and did. His entire upper body felt like someone had put it in a vice tight enough to hurt, then tightened it some more until it went numb, left it that way a while, then loosened it so everything could get good and screamingly painful again. 

But he recognized this pain. He knew very well where it came from. That was the kicker: it was his own fault, he'd done this to himself. The blinding headache, the stiffness and soreness of his jaw, the stabbing pain in his temples: all of that came from clenching his own jaw way too hard, for hours or days at a time. The pain in his chest and shoulders came from constantly holding those muscles tighter and tighter. 

He'd been through this a few times before, with stress and insomnia. The insomnia made everything that happened seem flatter and greyer, somehow. Things didn't seem to matter so much. Even pain. It was almost comforting. So when things got bad, maybe you gritted your teeth a little harder or clenched your muscles too much, minor pain like that didn't seem to matter very much in the scheme of things. 

The first night's sleep didn't make you feel normal again, that would take many full nights in a row. And what were the chances of being able to sleep a full night through, much less several nights in row, when the first night healed you just enough to really feel your pain again, but not enough to remove it? 

Godammit, he was going to have to start doing those bloody stupid relaxation exercises again, with the breathing and the bloody fucking _mindfulness_, he _hated_ relaxation, goddamn it. 

He'd do it, though. He needed to start pulling this shit back together. 

In the meantime he'd been attacked by his own people, sort of, nothing made sense and therefore he was going to find someone he could shoot (or at least yell at, but preferably shoot) until it did. Time to go. 

The door to his bunk room didn't open automatically when he approached it, and his whispered command to open brought no response, but when he tapped a command into the fixed terminal, the door opened. 

Holding his weapon ready, he stalked quiety to the cockpit, went through the open door and was greeted by an awful sight. The place looked like it had been gutted. Nothing was where it should be. The console bank had been unbolted from the floor and sat slightly askew and bare; all the screens and other parts that should have been attached to it had been removed. His display screens had each been put away in its own clear plastic container; the containers were stacked two deep against the wall. His navigation system casings were all open, like gaping wounds with the mechanical guts exposed. 

The floor space was mostly taken up by rows of pristine white electrically inert mats. Upon the mats lay plastic breadboard trays with a variety of electronic components, large and small - components that, Turin realised with dawning horror, must have been been taken _from his ship_ \- arranged upon them in neat rows, secured with plastic cable ties (the kind you could use as shitty handcuffs if you were desperate, Turin had never seen those used for their actual intended purpose before) each component paired with its own neat little label. 

Sitting in the midst of all this was Bellus's guy, the one who had shot Turin with a dart earlier. The man sat, legs crossed, doing something to an electronic doo-dad that no doubt belonged to Turin's ship. He was thirty-ish, dressed in black, with long hair pulled into a ponytail, and attractive despite the mustache and beard that covered much of his face. He looked up as Turin came in, expression blank. 

Turin flicked his weapon to a lower setting as he aimed for center-chest. The man wasn't wearing body armor after all, and he didn't want to cause a lot of splatter that could get on his ship's components. 

"Who are you and what are you doing to my ship?" Turin barked. 

The man stood slowly, holding out his hands in a gesture of surrender, but he didn't seem as intimidated as Turin would have liked. If anything the man seemed bored. 

"Answer me," Turin demanded. He gave his weapon a little wiggle, just to remind the man that it was there. 

Instead of answering, the man took a slow step, then another, which brought him to the wall of the cockpit. Bizarrely, the man thumped the wall twice with the side of his fist. 

"What are you doing?" Turin snarled, following the man with his gun. 

"Bellus will come," the man said. His voice was quiet and nearly expressionless. He cast a look of longing at the piece of tech he'd been working on before Turin had interrupted him, as if that was the only thing in the room that truly interested him. 

"Well, is there something wrong with your comms?" Turin asked peevishly, still holding his weapon aimed at the man. 

There came a sound of footsteps in another part of the ship, and Bellus's voice: "Can he hear me? Turin, don't shoot anyone, I'll be there in a minute." 

Moments passed, tensely. 

"You wanna put that thing away?" the man asked, pointing with his chin at Turin's gun. 

"Not really," Turin replied with a tight, angry smile. 

The man gave a little shrug. Moving with the exaggerated slowness of a person who has a weapon pointed at them at close range, he stepped back to his previous position and lowered himself to sit at the mat where he'd been working earlier. He took up one of the electronic thingies in one hand and some sort of tool in the other. 

"Stop that," Turin snapped. "What are you doing? Put that down." 

"Okay," the strange man said, slowly lowering the object to the mat, "but someone needs to fix this ship before it can fly out of here, and who else is going to do it, you? This ship is 11 years old and the casings have never even been opened before today, so I'm guessing you're not exactly Mr Fixit with a spaceship. And I don't know if you noticed, but the manufacturer's warranty is voided." 

Rage boiled up within Turin, and he fought down the urge to grind his teeth. Or shoot someone. "Ship?" he tried, without much hope. There was no reply. 

"I took your ship's AI offline," the man added casually. "By the way, don't come any closer unless you want to get electrocuted." 

Turin focused hard on not clenching his jaw. A few tense moments passed until Bellus came up the corridor behind him. 

"Nice to see you're awake again, Goldilocks," Bellus said cheerfully, "thought we were going to have to start calling you Sleeping Beauty." 

"Bellus Haardy," Turin growled, still pointing his gun at the stranger, "do you want to give me one good reason why I shouldn't have you court-martialled, stripped of rank and, oh yeah, executed right goddamn now?" 

"So we have some things to discuss," Bellus said mildly. 

"You're goddamn right we do." Turin switched to a stance that put him sideways to the doorway, so he could switch his gaze from the ship-disassembling asshole in the cockpit to Bellus in the corridor. He noticed the slight change in airflow that meant his cargo bay doors were open, the acrid scent on the air, the red dirt that had been tracked in on Bellus's boots. "We're in the Badlands. Why are we in the Badlands?" 

"That's one of the things we have to discuss," Bellus said. 

"Why is this asshole disassembling my ship?" Turin asked. 

"That's another," Bellus replied evenly. 

"Actually I disassembled it earlier," the asshole put in, "now I'm putting it back together." 

"I told him to," Bellus said. "I'll get Joe and then we'll talk." 

"Joe's here too?" 

"If you want you can sort yourself out, take a shower or whatever." 

"A shower?" Turin said incredulously. "I'm good, thanks. How about we just skip to the part where you explain why I shouldn't shoot you, and Joe, and this asshole right goddamn now." 

"Fine, I'll get Joe. In the meantime don't shoot my guy." Bellus walked out in the direction of the cargo bay. 

Turin snorted, and lowered his weapon a few degrees. 

Bellus returned a minute or so later. "Joe's outside," she said, "Let's go for a nice scenic walk through the Badlands." To the man on the floor she added: "You, you come too, you can finish this up later." 

"Oh, goody," said the asshole. 


	10. A cozy chat in the Badlands

Bellus led the two men out of the cockpit and through the ship to the cargo bay. The bay doors opened out onto a wasteland of flat red dirt stetching as far as the eye could see, rising to sheer cliff faces in the distance. A blue sky stretched out overhead. It was sunny but not warm. There was no sign of any living thing. 

They trooped down the cargo bay ramp to find a rugged land vehicle parked just outside. It was the kind with thick, corrugated tires and bars to grab onto instead of a roof or doors. Leaning against the vehicle was Big Joe, looking as unflappable as ever. 

Bellus turned to Turin. "You know why we brought you here, right?" 

Turin had a few guesses. "Because you've gone insane?" he hazarded. "Because you like the Badlands this time of year? I don't know." 

"Because we need to talk," Bellus said firmly. "We can talk here." 

Joe explained: "We know you want to deal with Khlyen on your own, but let's face it, you're not dealing with it, you're just losing your shit. You need help." 

"Excuse me?" Turin said incredulously, "_I'm_ losing my shit? I'm not the one that drugged, assaulted and, oh yeah, abducted a superior officer!" 

At the same time that Turin was saying this, Joe talked over him: "One minute you're happy, next minute you're yelling. Or you just zone out. I don't think you even notice it's happening. And some of the stuff you say doesn't even make sense. I mean, really doesn't make sense. I don't know what you're going to do, I don't know if I should be calling a doctor for you or what!" 

Bellus watched all this with raised eyebrows. 

"Wait a minute," Turin said, incredulous, "is this an _intervention_? You kidnapped a superior officer because you're worried about my _emotional state_? And you think I'm the crazy one here?" 

"It's not an intervention," Bellus scoffed. 

"Except it kind of is," Big Joe put in. 

"We're here because we need to talk about problems that we can't normally talk about." Bellus glared meaningfully at Turin. 

Turin stared back at her, eyebrows raised, completely baffled. 

"Because of the dirt," she explained. 

"Because it's the Badlands," Joe put in. "The dirt is bad." 

"The dirt is... bad?" Turin repeated slowly. "Nope, sorry, still not making sense. Try again." 

"Tell him," Bellus said, impatient and annoyed. 

"The dirt here is bad," Joe said again. "You can't fly a ship in. The nav fritzes." 

"You can't fly a ship into the Badlands, everyone knows that," Turin said impatiently, "so why the hells are we here?" 

"Well, we're right on the edge of it," Joe explained, "that's why we need the land runner." 

"No, that's not - come on, you, tell him the right way." Bellus addressed this to the as yet unnamed ship disassembler. 

The unnamed man gave a respectful nod to Joe, which made Bellus roll her eyes. He spoke solemnly: "It's like he said, the dirt is bad. This whole region used to be a giant mine. The Company ripped up the entire landscape, all the way down to the bedrock. They crushed the rock to powder then ran it through a gas injection process using a lot of novel semi-stable materials for binding agents. What they left behind isn't just poisonous, it scatters electromagnetic radiation in ways that can't be predicted, not even by a computer. It'll disrupt the navs of any ship that tries to fly in, and any signal sent in or out gets scrambled and dispersed." 

Turin replied: "Okay, Science Professor, is there a point to this?" 

"The point is, you can't fly a ship in, and there's no communications of any kind in or out." 

"As in, we can talk and no-one can listen in," Bellus put in impatiently. 

"Not even theoretically," added Bellus's guy. 

"Oh," Turin said. After a moment's thought he added: "Huh. That's actually pretty useful." 

Bellus rolled her eyes again. "Turin, everyone, get in the land runner, we'll drive out in into Badlands, into the heart of the dead zone, and then we can have a nice little conversation." 

Big Joe produced a scarf from under his jacket, wrapped it around his head until only his eyes were visible, and got behind the wheel. They rode with the wind roaring in their ears and the sand getting into their eyes, noses and mouths, and clothes. Eventually Joe stopped the vehicle in the middle of nowhere and they all got out, eagerly stretching their legs after the uncomfortable ride. 

All of them except Joe rubbed at their eyes and ears, trying to get the dirt out. Turin walked a few paces, then turned back to face Bellus and Joe and declared: "This is the worst intervention ever. Next time skip the assault and kidnapping and send me to a nice spa instead." 

Joe chuckled. 

"Alright," Bellus said, addressing the ship-disassembler, "tell us what you found in Turin's ship." 

The man looked at Turin. "Bellus says you think your ship is being tracked. Well you're right, it is, and the tech is like nothing I've seen." 

"Can you remove the trackers?" Turin asked. 

The man exchanged a look with Bellus. "I can," he said slowly, "but I don't think you want me to." 

"Oh, I'm pretty sure I do," Turin replied with a tight smile, his fists clenching and unclenching. 

The man explained: "If I remove the trackers, whoever is tracking you will know, and they'll just send someone to do the job again. Probably with even more sophisticated tech that will be even harder to find. And worse, they'll know that you know, and that you're treating them as a hostile adversary. You'll be better off acting like you either don't know you're being spied on or don't care. I can put everything back exactly the way it was, so they won't notice their trackers were ever interfered with." 

"But then I'm still being spied on in my own ship!" Turin objected. 

"Come on, Turin, you know he's right," Bellus said. 

"You're talking about 24-hour surveillance in my own home," Turin protested. "I can't live like that, no-one can." 

"Most people live like that," Joe said flatly. "In Westerley at least. Why do you think the Company controls all the tech that comes in and out of the Quad? It's not just so they can charge high prices and make deals with the suppliers, it's also so they can put in as much spyware as they want. It's illegal to tamper with the cameras in public places, and in schools and Company buildings, and it's also illegal to have non-company-approved tech, even just a communicator or audio-video player, which means they basically spy on us everywhere. I mean, it's not called 'spying', it's called 'data collection', because it's the Company and they're supposed to be the good guys, but still." 

"This isn't the Company," Turin argued. "This is that psychopath, Khlyen." 

"I'm just saying, get over yourself. So Khlyen can watch you in the shower if he wants, so what?" 

Turin made a sour face. 

"Hey, guy, go take a walk," Bellus ordered. 

The man gave a nod and set off at a fast walk into the sunset. 

Turin watched him go. The man was attractive, despite being a ship-disassembling asshole. "Where is he going?" Turin asked. 

"Nowhere," Bellus replied, "he knows we just want to talk in private." 

"What's his story? Does he want to be a Killjoy? Do you want to mentor him?" 

Joe cleared his throat and coughed at the same time. 

"You're already mentoring him," Turin guessed, "but not officially. Why didn't you come talk to me, what's wrong with him?" 

Joe rolled his eyes heavenwards. 

"Nothing's wrong with him," Bellus replied, "he's good. He'll make a fine junior partner. For someone else. Spare me the lecture, Turin, we have bigger things to talk about." 

"Oh, we are going to talk about this," Turin said angrily. 

"How about we talk about Khlyen, the psycho that keeps threatening to kill you," Bellus said bluntly. "We need to put our information together, that's the whole point of coming to this gods-forsaken place, so listen up. Here's what Joe and I have put together so far. Our main problem is Khlyen, bigwig of the Interstellar RAC and raving psychopath. There's also Yalena Yardeen, aka Dutch, aka the Murder Princess of Kefferee, aka Bloody Yalena, who Khlyen had trained from childhood to be his perfect little killing machine. Joe told you about her 'special skills', right?" 

"Oh yes," Turin replied bitterly, "and so did Khlyen. Repeatedly. She has special training, she has special skills, she needs to do nothing but Level Five kill warrants because everything else is beneath her. She's been a professional killer since she was ten, apparently. That's just the kind of charming detail Khlyen likes to share." 

Joe looked mildly sick. "We're not here to talk about Dutch," he said, "she's one of us. We're here to talk about Khlyen." 

Bellus said: "We're here to talk about both. Anyway. The way Joe and I have it figured, the girl, Yalena or Dutch or whatever her calls herself now, decides she wants nothing to do with Khlyen, runs away and ends up in the Quad, possibly after marrying and brutally murdering the King of Kefferee, that part isn't clear. Anyway, Khlyen gets word that she's in the Quad and starts pulling strings to control her from afar." 

"I'm the strings," Turin said bitterly. 

"Right. So Khlyen has Yardeen or whoever she is recruited to the RAC and starts her off at Level 5. He's obsessed with her taking kill warrants. Which she apparently won't do even though she has at least some of the skills required." 

"She won't take Level 5 warrants," Joe confirmed, "I can't make her." 

"You haven't even tried to make her," complained Bellus. 

"Do we even know for sure that Khlyen's really in the RAC?" Joe asked, changing the subject. 

"Oh, trust me, I didn't want to believe it either," Turin replied bitterly. "I've made enquiries, lots of them, he's definitely high-up Interstellar RAC. But in all his interactions with me, he's not going through official channels. He's acting like a pirate, but a pirate that still has the authority of the RAC behind him." 

"Is there any chance you could get him fired? Or, I don't know, impeached, or something?" asked Joe. 

"You really don't know much about how military chains of command work, do you?" Turin asked. "Those people outrank me, they're not going to listen to a thing I say. I'm not Khlyen - I can't go outside proper channels, and proper channels will get me precisely nowhere." 

"Huh." Joe shrugged. 

"The real question is, what is Khlyen going to do?" Bellus said. "We know he's been threatening you, Turin. What threats has he been making, exactly?" 

"Well, he's threatened to have me killed a bunch of times," Turin replied, "although I'm starting to think that's his idea of flirting. He wants Yardeen safe, and he wants Yardeen taking kill warrants, and he doesn't seem to understand that those things don't go together. He's threatened Joe a few times." 

"Me?" Joe asked. "Why?" 

"I imagine he just wanted to spread the threats around a little," Turin replied. "I don't have any family in the Quad, so you must have just been the closest person he could find." 

"No, that makes sense," Bellus said. "Think about it, what does Khlyen want more than anything? To control his murder princess. He sees himself as her mentor and some kind of twisted substitute parent figure. And Turin, I'm guessing this Khlyen is a real upper crust type, right? Aristocratic?" 

"I'm not exactly an expert," Turin hedged, "but yeah, I'd say so." 

"So Khlyen raises her to be his perfect little princess-assassin, but the girl rejects him, runs away, and finds herself a new mentor - our Joe, a humble man, a Westerlyn. For a guy like Khlyen, that's got to really stick in his craw. No offence meant, Joe." 

"None taken." 

"Well anyway, we're in a good position," Bellus said. "We have him contained." 

"How is he contained?" Turin asked, baffled and exasperated. 

"Look, he can't do anything," Bellus replied. "He can't move against Turin because that would risk Yardeen finding out he's pulling strings behind the scenes, and she'd just run away again. He can't move against Joe, no matter how much he hates him - and I'm guessing Khlyen hates Joe a whole lot - because it would make Yardeen hate Khlyen even more, and, again, it would reveal he's pulling strings behind the scenes. And she'd just run away. Khlyen wants to keep Yardeen here in the Quad, where he can keep track of her, but Yardeen and Jacobis don't have any connections here other than Joe. And I know I heard Jacobis say he thinks Westerley is a shithole. Joe might actually be the only thing keeping them in the Quad." 

"That's not true," Joe objected, but he didn't sound certain of it. 

"Yardeen _likes_ him," Bellus insisted. "I saw her practically hug him yesterday." 

"It was a comradely arm-clasp," said Joe. 

Turin stroked the bridge of his nose and said: "Joe, do you remember our talk the other day about emotional manipulation?" 

Joe just sighed. 

"That reminds me," Turin put in, "the last time I talked to Khlyen he said something about being pleased that Yardeen made use of her skills, which I'm guessing means she gruesomely killed someone and spread their remains in a thin paste over the surrounding area. But I know she's only taken Level 1 and Level 2 warrants so far, so do you want to tell me what that was about?" 

Joe looked up through his lashes. "Not really?" 

Bellus was smug. "So that worked, did it? I thought it might." 

"What worked?" Turin asked. 

"Oh, I had Yardeen take out a few people who needed it, off the books, so to speak." 

"People?" Turin repeated. 

"No-one important. Just some scum who won't be missed." 

"But -" 

"Leave it, Turin." 

"Okay, I don't care, but how did you manage that?" Turin asked incredulously. "I mean, I thought she didn't want to kill anyone. How are you so good at getting people to do things for you?" 

Bellus just shrugged and said: "Can't reveal all my secrets. The important thing is, now we know that even if Khlyen keeps demanding Level Fives, he'll settle for a lot less than that. We just need to make sure she kills someone occasionally. That just means she has to keep on being a Killjoy, we all know that it's part of the job. Even if you aren't doing Level 5 warrants, sometimes someone doesn't want to be locked and served and you have to insist. 

"But listen, my guess is that when Yardeen first arrived in the Quad, Khlyen panicked, and, Turin, that's why he leaned on you so hard. But if he's not completely stupid, normally he'd have to be a lot more subtle than that. I think things will be a lot more low-key from now on. Khlyen will still be in your life, but he'll be in the background. And then maybe you can stop losing your goddamn mind about it. I know it's not my business, but you need to sort yourself out. See a doctor or whatever." 

"Thanks," Turin said sarcastically, "you're a very supportive friend." 

"I try." Bellus clapped him twice on the shoulder and flashed him a sharky grin. 

"We'll meet here to talk every so often," Joe put in, "deep in the Badlands. Maybe every few weeks or so. Or Turin, if you ever need to talk urgently, just send us a signal. We need to decide what the signal is." 

"I'll say I want to go parson shooting," Turin suggested. 

"Great," Joe agreed. 

Turin swung his arms and looked around. The wasteland stretched around them. 

"So, time to go back?" Bellus suggested hopefully. 

"In a minute, I need to think," replied Turin. He strolled aimlessly a few paces, then turned and strolled aimlessly in a different direction. 

"You know, you could think just as well after we get indoors," Bellus said sourly. She adjusted the waistband of her trousers with a grimace. "Somewhere that doesn't have toxic dirt everywhere. Like in your spaceship." 

Turin turned to face the other two. He stretched his arms out wide, then let them fall limply to his sides with a dull twap. 

"So that's it them. All that drama. For what? We just drive out into the Badlands and decide to do nothing at all? Seems a little anti-climatic." 

Joe shrugged. Bellus said: "Sometimes doing nothing is the best thing you can do." 

"So this is my life then. My newest RAC agents are the Murder Princess of Kefferee and her space pirate boyfriend, and I'm stuck with them, probably until I die. Or until they get bored. Meanwhile, that psycho gets to keep on spying on me in my own ship." 

Turin's jaw ticked and he set off pacing again, while Bellus and Joe exchanged a look. 

Just as abruptly as he'd started, Turin stopped pacing again. "Well alright then. Just remember, next time: spa. One with steam baths and massages and attractive scantily clad attendants." 

Joe chuckled, and even Bellus let out a "Heh." 

After a moment Turin asked: "So, Bellus, there's no comms of any kind out here, right?" 

"Right." 

"So how do we get your guy to come back here? Or were you just going to let him keep walking forever?" 

"Huh. Hadn't thought of that." 

"Get in the land runner," Joe instructed. "We'll pick him up, he's just over that way." 


	11. Loose ends

They picked up Bellus's guy and drove back to the ship, where the man informed them that he needed at least another couple of hours to finish his repairs. Turin left him to it and led the two Killjoys to the kitchen where he set the kettle to boil. 

It was bizarre, having people in his ship. Everything about this whole situation was bizarre, but still. Joe and Bellus in his galley, instead of in a RAC station briefing room or at the Royale, where they belonged. Bellus's unofficial apprentice in his cockpit, doing unspeakable things to his ship's innards. They must have all been in here for hours while he'd been unconscious. Walking around, touching his things. 

"This is the first time I've been in your ship," Joe said, perhaps picking up on Turin's thoughts. "It's nice." 

Bellus snorted. 

"A little plain," Joe amended. "But nice." 

Turin got out two mugs, measured out 15ml of instant coffee granules into each, poured water, and stirred. He handed one to Joe, who muttered "thanks", and shot Bellus a glare. 

"People who abuse the apprenticeship system don't deserve coffee," he growled. 

Bellus rolled her eyes, but nevertheless looked contrite. "Alright," she said. "I know you want to get it off your chest. Go on." 

Joe looked at Bellus and then at Turin uncertainly. "Should I go?" he asked. 

"No need," Turin said pleasantly. 

"Probably," Bellus muttered, at the same time. 

"You don't need to go," Turin said, smiling, "because I'm not going to chew Bellus out right now. I'm going to do that later. In a more formal capacity." 

"Damn," Bellus said. "Fine. When are you calling me in?" 

"Oh, you'll be notified." Turin smirked into his coffee like the evil, petty tyrant he was. 

Joe gave Bellus a sympathetic look. No-one liked being called in to the RAC. When it happened, it usually meant that a Killjoy had screwed up severely and was going to be punished even more severely. 

"Well, we've got two hours to kill," Turin said, sipping at his coffee. 

"Yup," Joe agreed. 

"Hmm." 

Bellus went to the sideboard and quietly made herself a cup of coffee. Turin pretended not to notice. 

"One thing I still don't understand," Turin mused, "was there ever really going to be a dinner party?" 

"Well, O'wyn wanted to have one," Bellus replied, stirring her coffee. "He suggested it. That's where I got the idea." 

"Hmm." 

They sipped their coffee. 

"I could put on a video, if you both feel like watching something," Turin suggested. 

"Stream-downloading won't work here," Joe cautioned. 

"I know, but I have a pretty decent video collection." 

"What do you have?" Bellus asked, curious. 

"Lots of things. I've been watching _Neon Valley Streets_ lately, I'm on season 3." 

"I doubt it, they only made two seasons of that," Bellus said flatly. "Wait a minute, Turin, do you mean _the original series_?" 

"Of course I do. That reboot version was terrible." 

"Abominable," Bellus agreed heartily. "It's amazing how they managed to get everything completely wrong. The casting, the writing, everything. Ugh. But the original - do you have an actual copy? Those are pretty rare." 

Turin just grinned at her. 

"Joe?" Bellus asked. 

"It's not really my thing," the Killjoy said mildly, looking at them over his cup of coffee. 

"You know we're talking about _the original series_, right?" Bellus said, pronouncing the words as if they were sacred. "Not that gods-awful reboot version." 

"Either way," Joe replied, "It's not really my thing, but you guys go ahead. I think I'll check in on Bellus's guy and then strip down the land runner and clean it. That Badlands dirt has a tendency to damage equipment and I don't want to get problems later on." 

Bellus looked offended on behalf of her favourite show. Turin shrugged and said: "Suit yourself. You need to borrow any tools?" 

"Yeah. I found where you keep them earlier. I promise I'll put everything back in its place after." 

"Okay, but I'd better go with you and show you where everything is, anyway." 

Turin set down his half-finished coffee and was about to follow Joe out of the room when Bellus suddenly said: "Turin, I just remembered, there is one other matter I need to discuss with you." 

Turin looked at Bellus blankly. Joe said: "Okay, I'll see you down there I guess," and exited the kitchen. 

Once he was gone Bellus said: "You should pay that man." 

"Okay?" Turin replied. 

"Ever since this whole pile of shit started he's been taking care of those two snot-nosed kids instead of doing his real work. His income must be a fraction of what it should be." 

"I know," Turin agreed with a slump of his shoulders. 

"Everything he's doing to help Murder Girl and her boyfriend, he's really doing it to help you. That means right now, his problems are your problems." 

"I know," Turin replied, "you don't have to convince me, I'm agreeing with you." After a moment's thought he added: "I should probably slip him a couple of thousand joy, right?" 

"Five thousand or so I'd say, at least, to start. He's going to be saddled with those two for a long time. Six months maybe, that's how long an apprenticeship normally lasts. Even though it isn't a normal apprenticeship. Maybe towards the end he'll be back to doing proper work again, but for now he's stuck with mostly Level Ones and Level Twos and splitting it three ways, and that's no way to make money." 

"I agree," Turin said mildly. 

"Pay him today, before we all go our separate ways in Oldtown." 

"Well there's no rush," Turin replied, "and obviously I don't have that kind of money lying around, I'll have to go to the bank to do a transfer." 

"There's that crate of fuel cells in the cargo hold, those things are as good as currency. And under the table's better anyway." 

"Alright, I'll discuss it with him. There's no rush, I'm sure he has some savings." 

"Doubt it." 

"You doubt it?" 

"I'm pretty sure he's broke." 

"Joe earns about the same as you, you know." 

"I know that. Doesn't change the fact that he's broke." 

"How can be broke? Does he have a gambling problem or something?" 

"No, but he's a Westerlyn, you know." 

"What does that have to do with anything?" 

Bellus rolled her eyes and sighed deeply, exasperated, as if she thought Turin was being unbelievably stupid and she suspected he was doing it on purpose, to annoy her. 

"Well?" Turin asked impatiently. 

Bellus rolled her eyes again. 

"Yes, alright, thanks, that's very helpful," Turin said sarcastically. He retrieved his coffee from where he'd left it earlier, took a slurp, and winced at the fact that it was lukewarm, and to be honest the stuff didn't taste very good even when it was hot. After a moment he said in a thoughtful tone of voice: "He still has that old spaceship of his. That thing must be a hundred years old." 

"It's a junker," Bellus put in. 

"He loves that ship," Turin mused. 

"He does. But it's a piece of shit." 

"It is," Turin agreed. "The one time I went aboard that thing, I was afraid I was going to get gangrene or something. What a wreck." 

"Turin," Bellus said thoughtfully, "you've been in the Quad what, ten years now?" 

"A little more than that, actually," Turin replied. 

"But you've spent the whole time living at the RAC station." 

"I live in my ship, I dock at the RAC station," Turin corrected. 

"Sure. But most of the people you work with are like you, they aren't local, they came here from somewhere else. You don't spend much time on either of the moons. Or Qresh for that matter." 

"I go fishing on Leith sometimes," Turin said. 

"You know most Westerlyns are really poor, right?" Bellus asked, apparently changing the subject. "The most common occupation is miner, and the Company doesn't pay miners enough to live on." 

"Are we talking about Joe again?" Turin asked. "Because Joe isn't a miner, he's a Killjoy, so I don't see how that applies." 

"There's a saying," Bellus went on, "that whenever a Westerlyn makes some money, if they're smart and they want to get ahead in life, they move to Leith and forget everyone they ever knew. Because otherwise, what happens? They stay on Westerley, and they're still a Westerlyn. And that means they still have parents and siblings and cousins and all the rest of it, and people don't like to ask for help, but sooner or later someone gets injured or goes into debt or loses their job or their kid gets sick, and then they'll ask." 

There was an uncomfortable pause. 

"I get it," Turin said slowly. "Shit. He's probably supporting half a dozen families, isn't he? This is going to get expensive." 

"I don't know," Bellus said, holding her hands up defensively, palms outwards. "I never asked. You know me, I don't go poking my nose in other people's business. I don't know Joe's situation. I'm just speaking generally. You just have to look at Joe, and think about the kind of man he is, and think about where he comes from, and extrapolate. He's always broke, has been as long as I've known him. And he doesn't have any vices to speak of, not really. He likes a drink at the Royale as much as the next person, but nothing beyond that." 

"At least half a dozen families," Turin concluded wonderingly. "Shit. Well, okay, I'll give him the fuel cells like you said. Thanks for telling me." 

"No need to make a big production of it," Bellus advised sagely. "Just load them up on a cart truck and tell him to take it with him when he goes." 

"Alright," Turin said, and then changed the subject completely. "So what about this guy of yours?" 

"What about him? He's excellent," Bellus replied. "Not like Joe's snot-nosed twerps." 

"Never mind Joe's kids, tell me about your guy. What's excellent about him? What are his skills like, what have you seen him do?" 

"Oh, he's got all the skills and then some," Bellus said happily. "He's good with a weapon, he has his own set of a gazillion blasters and projectiles he made himself, all different shapes and sizes, each one for a particular purpose. Never could convince him to let me touch any of them. He takes good care of his gear too, cleans and reloads and refuels and stores everything properly. I'll miss his gear." Bellus had gone a little misty-eyed at the thought of all that custom weaponry. "And he's good at unarmed combat, a little too fancy for my taste, I don't see the point in all those spinning back-kicks and whatnot when a good old fist will do the job, but it's effective. He's smart and he thinks on his feet. He doesn't go crazy. He's violent when violence is called for and he's calm the rest of the time. How many Killjoys can honestly say that? Most people are either too much of one or too much of the other. Although of course I haven't actually seen him do any physical violence, obviously, since that would be illegal." 

"I'm sure you just went to the gym with him and had a nice little spar," Turin said, using a sarcastic little sing-song voice while glaring at Bellus to make it clear he thought she was full of shit. 

"That's right. And he's good with tech, you saw that." 

"I'll wait and see if my ship actually flies again before I believe you on that one. I assume he can pilot?" Turin checked. 

"Obviously." 

"Tracking?" 

"He makes his own drone trackers. I don't think he knows how to do it the old-fashioned way, but we can't all be Joe Cyano." 

"No we cannot. Soft skills? Communicating, verbally persuading people, that kind of thing?" 

"Ah, about average I suppose," Bellus said vaguely. 

"So, terrible," Turin surmised. 

Bellus shrugged, her disinterested expression making it clear that she thought soft skills were useless anyway. "Look," she said, "Joe's brats will be worth something in a few months' time, maybe, if he keeps teaching them the whole time. My guy's ready now. That's the difference. Making him do an apprenticeship will be a formality. I explained the warrant system to him and he picked it up quick as anything. He'll be an asset right from his first day." 

"So if this guy is so great," Turin asked, "why don't you want to mentor him?" 

Bellus shrugged. "Because I don't want to mentor anyone. It's extra effort and the RAC wouldn't make it worth my while. I like working alone, I don't want a partner." 

"But you've had him as an unofficial partner for, what, it must be couple of weeks at least." 

"A couple of months, and that's different. He's unofficial. He's so desperate to join the RAC he's been happy to do whatever I ask, without question, but that will all change once he's officially recruited. Oh, he plays at being perfectly meek and obedient, but I see through him; he has a mind of his own, and as soon as he has official standing he'll want an equal say in things. I can't be dealing with that." 

Turin looked down, rubbed the bridge of his nose, looked up at her through his lashes and said in a pained tone: "Bellus Haardy, you're a terrible person." 

"I know, It keeps me up at night." 

"I don't believe that for a second." 

"You're right, the truth is, I sleep like a baby." She flashed him a shark-like grin. "It comes from having no morals, you should try it." 

Turin sighed. "Alright, well, if you don't want to be a mentor, you probably shouldn't be one." 

"Does this mean you're not..." 

"Oh, I'm still calling you in. I just wanted to know about your guy. What's his name anyway?" 

"No idea." 

"What do you - how? Never mind, I don't want to know." 

"He keeps changing it. I think it's his idea of a joke." 

"Whatever, I don't want to know. We'll talk more about this later." 

* * * 

Bellus's guy finally declared the ship fit to fly, and Turin gingerly set them on a slow intra-atmo course for Westerley. He then ordered Joe and Bellus out of the cockpit, but told Bellus's guy to stay. 

"Son, I hear from Bellus you want to join the RAC, is that right?" he asked. 

"Yes." 

No wasted words with this one. Alright. "Bellus tells me you're good enough, and since she's one of my finest agents I'm inclined to believe her, but it's not that easy. Lots of good people want to join and never get the chance. You'd need a sponsor, but neither Joe nor Bellus will do it. Joe already has two junior partners. Bellus doesn't want an apprentice, and I can't force her, no matter how much I might think she treated you unfairly." 

"I'm not worried," replied the man. 

"You're not worried?" Turin repeated, his eyebrows shooting up. "Really? Because from where I'm standing, you should be worried. Lots of people want to be Killjoys, and most never get the chance. Bellus used you and then left you high and dry. So what makes you so sure of yourself?" 

The man gave an obnoxious little smirk. "It's like you said: I already proved myself. I have a respected high-level Killjoy saying I'm good enough. And I have a RAC commander owing me a favour." 

Turin muttered: "Well you don't need to be so arrogant about it." 

The man smirked a little harder. 

"Fine," Turin snapped. "You still need to do the apprenticeship period, it's a minimum of six months. Any idea who you want for a mentor, given that Bellus and Big Joe are both off the table?" 

The man replied at once: "Anmol Shivam". 

Turin's eyebrows went up again. "Huh. Why?" 

"She has nice gear." 

"That's not a good reason. I'm giving you to Bel Hadar, he was a military officer before he joined the RAC, he'll teach you how things should be done." 

"Yes, sir." 

Turin went on: "Bellus knows the correct procedures but she doesn't always follow them. And Joe - whatever you've learned from Joe, you should probably try to forget. Bel Hadar will set you straight. Pay attention to him, learn from him. You might think you'd rather not have someone looking over your shoulder, but six months isn't actually very long, and once it's over you might miss having someone to watch out for you." 

"Yes sir," the man replied. 

"Alright then. We'll get you in to the RAC the day after tomorrow to do this properly. What's your name, anyway? 

The man met Turin's gaze and said expressionlessly: "Fancy Lee." 

Turin's fists clenched and unclenched. "The noodle bar?" he asked, slowly and incredulously. "You want to name yourself after _the noodle bar?_ Do you have any idea how unprofessional that is? Goddammit, does anyone join the RAC under their actual name? You can't be Fancy Lee, pick another name." 

"I'm offended," said the man, his voice flat and expressionless, "the name 'Fancy Lee' has been in my family for many generations." 

"No it hasn't!" Turin shouted, infuriated. "Think of a different name! And get out of my sight. And report to my office at the RAC station the day after tomorrow at 16:00 hours." 

"Yes sir," the man said. The corner of his mouth quirked very slightly, as if he was holding back a smile. 


	12. Kissing not fighting

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter includes an explicit sex scene.

The journey to Oldtown took only a few minutes, during which Turin abused his position as RAC Commander to get an unscheduled docking space assigned to him with immediate permission to land at Westerley Main Space Docks. 

They were met at the docks by Yardeen and Jacobis, who were there to provide an armed escort for Joe and his valuable crate of fuel cells. Joe and his junior partners set off on a journey across Oldtown, while Bellus set off for home, cursing because her comm had blown up with dozens of angry messages from her husband, who wanted to know where the hell she'd been for the past 24 hours. 

The RAC's soon-to-be newest recruit lingered with Turin in the cargo bay. 

"Is there any particular place you want me to take you?" Turin asked the man who called himself Fancy Lee, "or are you happy just getting dropped off here?" 

"You dock on Westerley?" the man asked. 

"No, at the RAC station," Turin replied. 

"You live on the RAC station?" the man asked, surprised. 

"No," Turin replied, "I live on my spaceship. I dock at the RAC station." 

"That sounds like you live on the RAC station," the man said slowly. "That's kind of sad. Like one of those factory workers that sleeps on a shelf by their workstation and never gets to leave." 

"I get by just fine, thanks for your concern," Turin replied, annoyed and sarcastic. "Where do you dock, anyway?" 

"I don't have a ship at the moment. My old one met with an unfortunate explosion." 

"So, homeless," Turin surmised. 

"Renting a room at the Royale," the man corrected him. 

"Worse than homeless. How do you stand the noise?" 

The man took a step toward Turin, then another, which brought them almost chest to chest. It was odd. Holding Turin's gaze, he said softly: "If you're so worried, you should invite me to spend the night here instead." 

"Sure, there's a spare bunk," replied Turin. It would mean postponing his journey back to the RAC station until the morning, but that didn't matter much either way. 

The man just stared at him. Turin stared back, feeling vaguely that he had lost the thread of the conversation. Finally the man said: "You know that was a come-on, right? I don't actually need a place to sleep, I just want to have sex with you." 

"Oh," Turin said. He took a step back and put his arms out like a barrier. 

The man gave a nod of understanding and said: "Okay then, never mind." 

"Look," Turin said, annoyed, "I told you, you're already in the RAC. Day after tomorrow we'll get you sworn in, but that's a formality. You're in." 

Now the man looked confused. 

Turin said: "I don't know what Bellus has been telling you. Or..." he heaved a deep, aggravated sigh. "Or asking you to do..." 

The problem was that now he was thinking about it. Why couldn't the man have just kept his mouth shut about it? But no, he'd brought it up, and now Turin was thinking about it. And trying not to think about it. He willed himself not to blush or get aroused, but his body's circulatory system mostly ignored him. 

"Mostly she had me do surveillance," the man said. 

"Uh huh," Turin replied intelligently. 

"That's how her record is so high, she'd get me to follow the target, map the vulnerable points in their routine." 

"Right." 

"I monitored a lot of surveillance feeds. Once I helped set up an ambush." The man smiled. He must have picked up that slow, toothy smile from Bellus. "That was fun. But I never laid hands on anyone, because that would be illegal." 

"That doesn't sound so bad," Turin allowed grudgingly, "but she still shouldn't have done it. If she'd paid you, you would have been an illegal sub-contractor and I would have had to arrest you both. I take it she didn't pay you?" 

"No." 

"Good. So you were just doing favours." Turin sighed. "That's a loophole. What you were doing with Bellus - that isn't officially sanctioned by the RAC, it's just that we can't stop people from doing it and we'd look stupid if we tried, so we turn a blind eye. It doesn't matter, the point is, _that is not how the RAC works_. Superior officers won't expect you to do favours for them." 

"No, I know," the man said. 

"Especially sexual ones," Turin elaborated. 

"I understand," the man said. 

"And if they do you report them to me and I'll get them knocked out so fast their heads will spin." 

"Calm down, I know," said the man impatiently. 

"Then what was that just now? What were you expecting to get out of it?" 

"Sex," the man said bluntly, as if it was obvious. 

"Uh," Turin said, "well, that's..." he trailed off. 

The man took a step forward. "By the day after tomorrow, you'll be my superior officer, right?" he asked. 

"Right," Turin agreed. 

"And sex with a superior officer would be inappropriate." 

"Extremely inappropriate," Turin agreed. 

"So we should get it out of our systems now," the man concluded, as if that was reasonable and obvious. 

"I don't have anything in my system," Turin snapped. 

"Oh?" the man asked. His voice had gone softer and breathier than before. He took a small step back, but kept his gaze fixed on Turin. "Sorry," he added insincerely. "My mistake." 

And then he just stood there. He didn't step away or look away or do anything. He just stood, and looked. 

Turin stared back like an idiot. 

This was... not a good idea. Turin didn't do this, not like this, not on his ship. When he went to bed with someone it was in a hotel or (more often, to be honest) in a brothel. Very occasionally at the other person's home. And not with a subordinate. A colleague was okay, maybe, but not someone brand new and directly below him in the chain of command. He'd seen how bad that could get when he was in the army, he'd long ago decided he didn't want to be that kind of asshole. 

None of that mattered, though, he knew he was going to do it. Because he really really wanted to and he didn't have enough willpower not to. Why was he even bothering with this mental handwringing session when he already knew he was going to do it? 

"I'll just go to that spare bunk now, shall I?" the man said, without moving. 

"Goddammit," Turin said. He stepped forward and reached to touch the man's face. 

The man reached for him as well, and in the next moment they were kissing while having a low-key slap fight over arm placement. Both of them wanted to position themself on the outside, arms on the other's head or shoulders, neither of them wanted to be inside the other's embrace. 

Meanwhile, Fancy Lee kissed too forcefully. There was too much suction. There was _biting_. It was damn annoying, though Turin was almost too turned on to care. 

"Ease off, will you," Turin said, "it's kissing not fighting. Slow down." 

The man rolled his eyes, but obediently eased off. 

"You're cute," he said. 

"Oh, be quiet," responded Turin, who wasn't great at accepting compliments. 

"Yes sir," the man replied sarcastically. A moment later he added: "You like that, right? Giving orders, and being obeyed?" 

"This is going to go so much better if you stop talking," Turin said. 

The other man let out a soft laugh. 

"How about we move this to the bunk?" Turin suggested. 

"We can just..." the man said, and he gave Turin a little shove. 

"We can just what?" Turin asked, annoyed. 

"Against the wall," the man said, and then he was trying to shove Turin again, which led to some awkward grappling. 

"Already told you," Turin said, slapping at his hands, "it's not a fight. Also, we are not doing this standing against the wall, what are we, animals? Bunk. Come on." He pushed the man off and stormed across the cargo hold without waiting to see if the other man would follow him, ordering his ship to close the bay doors as he went. 

The man followed him out of the cargo hold and through the ship to his bunk room. Once there Turin barked: "Clothes off, boots off. Lie down on the fucking bed, under the covers not over them." 

"Okay," the man said, grinning. 

The two men stripped off their clothing. Turin got into the bed and snapped: "Get in," gesturing for the other man to join him. 

"Okay." Fancy Lee did as he was told, laying himself down next to Turin. "Sex now," he said. 

"More kissing now," Turin corrected. "Why are you in such a hurry, do you have someplace you need to go? Relax." He stroked the man's face, which left the man looking like he didn't know what he was supposed to do about it. "Can I take that thing out of your hair?" 

"I got it," the man replied, removing the hairband, and then Turin was stroking his fingers through all that silky stuff. He ran his lips over the man's face so he could feel the textures of beard and mustache, and then cheek and lips. He murmured into the man's ear: "You can pull my hair if you want, I like that. Not too hard though. Remember it's not a fight." 

"How hard's too hard?" the man asked immediately, and without waiting for an answer he took a fistful and tugged. 

"Mmmgood," Turin replied, settling in. 

While they kissed, the man hooked his leg around Turin's and tried to flip them over, which Turin evaded, and then he was doing something awkward with his knee, pushing it up between Turin's legs while trying to trap Turin's ankle with the other leg. 

Turin pulled back from the man's mouth and said irritably: "Why can't you just be still?" 

The man replied: "Why can't you just-" he gave a little twist that brought their crotches more or less together. "Okay?" 

Turin said nothing. His cock now hovered a milimeter from the skin of the man's lower abdomen, while he had the other man's penis poking against his upper thigh. Fancy wriggled his hand in there and began, lightly and hesitantly, to stroke him. Turin heard himself let out a little groan, which only encouraged the man. 

"Do you have lube?" Fancy asked. 

"I do, but-" 

"Where is it?" 

"Hang on a minute." 

"Where's the lube?" 

"Look, I just..." 

"Lube?" 

"Goddammit." 

Turin retrieved the lube from its place in the bedside drawer and handed it over. Fancy took the bottle from him opened it, sniffed, shrugged, poured out a big splodge and rubbed the stuff between his palms to get it warm. 

"I'm not going to last," Turin said bluntly. "Sorry. It's been a tense few days, I guess I'm kind of wound up." 

"Uh-huh," the man murmured, and then he was shifting himself up next to Turin, finding the angle where he could more or less stroke both their cocks at the same time. Turin gave up on rational thought, or any kind of thought, held on to the man and rocked with him as he stroked them both together, his focus narrowing until the entire world was just the motion of those goopy fingers curled around both their cocks. 

Turin came first, as expected, shaking and shuddering and trying to hold back a shout so that it came out as a demented drawn-out grunt. He had a vague impression of rolling to his side and being pushed back onto the mattress, of lips against his face and Fancy's voice urging: "Yeah, yeah, yeah." When he came back to his senses he lay on his back with Fancy at his side, hitched up on one elbow, lazily stroking his own cock as his eyes roamed over Turin's body. 

"Are you awake?" Fancy Lee asked. "I was starting to feel like a necrophiliac." 

"Fuck you," Turin said, without any real annoyance. The truth was he felt fucking fantastic. 

"Save that for round two," the man replied flatly, "if you think you have the stamina." His hand continued to move over his penis, steadily. It was mesmerising. 

"I could help you with that," Turin offered. 

"I got this." 

"I can see that. Doesn't seem very gentlemanly to let you do all the work, though." 

"Never said I wanted you to be a gentleman," Fancy replied. 

"Hmm." Turin rolled onto his side, scooched himself into a comfortable enough position, and ran his hand up Fancy's inner thigh. Next he ran his fingers over the man's asshole, and then set to playing with his balls, watching the man's face the whole time. Fancy kept on stroking himself and didn't react much, but the balls-stroking earned Turin a few little sighs and hitched breaths, so Turin settled in to just doing that. 

"So," Turin said conversationally, "I guess I should stop, right? Since you don't need any help, and you don't want me to be a gentleman." 

"No stopping," Fancy replied, voice clipped. So, he was probably doing a good job, then. 

"Well then, do you want me to go harder?" 

"Do what you want." 

"Dangerous thing to say." 

Turin kept on doing what he was doing. They worked in silence for a few minutes until Fancy came, cursing and spraying semen all over Turin's sheets and Turin himself. 

They lay side by side in silence for a few moments. 

"I'm getting cleaned up," Turin announced, "back in a minute." 

The man gave a little grunt of acknowledgement. 

In the shower room Turin first squirted soap all over himself and then took the shortest shower of his life, just long enough to rinse away the combination of soap, sweat and ejaculate. He toweled himself off quickly and impatiently, getting through several towels in rapid succession. Clean and dry, he hurried back to his bunk room but paused in the doorway, leaning on one side of the door frame and taking in the sight of Fancy naked in his messed-up bed. The man looked at him. 

"I'm going to ask a question," Turin announced, "and I want a yes or no answer with no snarky comments." 

"Okay?" 

"Do you want to cuddle?" 

Fancy Lee sat up and let his legs hang over the side of the bed. "I'll shower first," he said. 

Then the man stood, stepped up to Turin and murmured: "You're the little spoon," before pushing past him. 

Turin grinned and got back into bed, flipped over the bed cover so at least the worst of the yuck wouldn't touch his skin, and scrunched his head around in the pillows until he was perfectly comfortable. 


	13. Changing over

Fancy was gone when Turin awoke the next morning, which, he told himself, was for the best. 

The day after that was Fancy's swearing in. Turin had orded Bellus to come in to the RAC for 15:30 so he could make her sit and wait for twenty minutes, and hopefully get good and nervous, then get in a solid ten minutes' berating before making her witness Fancy's official swearing-in as a RAC agent at 16:00. 

At 15:50 Turin stormed into the small conference room where Bellus sat waiting, and glared. 

The woman in front of him didn't look nervous or embarrassed. If anything she seemed focused and determined. Damn. 

"RAC mentorship is not a joke," he said angrily. "It's not a game. It's not a cute way to get someone to do favours for you. Here in the Quad it is the only route by which we recruit new agents. It is a duty and a sacred trust. And you _shit all over it._" He dialed his voice up all the way up to a shout. Bellus didn't flinch, although most people would have. 

He went on once again in a more normal tone of voice: "Mentorship is integral to how the RAC works. It's how we make new RAC agents. And, Bellus Haardy, you may be Level Five, you may be one of our finest agents with an outstanding record of warrants filled, but you are the worst mentor I have ever seen. Do you want to tell me what the hells you were thinking?" 

Bellus said calmly, her voice just a little quieter than usual: "It worked out alright in the end." 

"No thanks to you!" Turin barked. "I'm the one who had to talk Bel Hadar into taking on a junior partner, a person he'd never even met before, with zero notice! That is a tremendous favour which, at some point in the future, I am going to have to pay back." 

Bellus gazed impassively straight ahead, and said nothing. 

Of course, Bellus knew very well that Hadar was Turin's friend and occasional fishing partner, and therefore repaying the favour wasn't likely to be too onerous - Hadar would probably just want to pick the time and location of their next fishing holiday or something like that. But that wasn't the point, gods damn it all. 

Turin growled: "If you have anything to say in your own defence, now's the time. Well?" 

Bellus said nothing. 

"Fine. I'm giving you a two week suspension. You'll keep your rank - which is _generous_, by the way - but I'm putting a special mark on you file. You're blocked from ever becoming a mentor. And if I ever hear of you undertaking an unofficial mentorship of any kind, ever again, I will knock you back down to Level One, is that clear?" 

Bellus finally spoke: "You're right, I'm a terrible mentor. It doesn't matter anyway, because I'm taking the warrant broker position, if it's still open." 

Turin changed track. "It is," he said. 

"I sent the application a few minutes ago, you should have it. Everything should be in order." 

Turin checked his handheld console; sure enough, Bellus's application was there. He took a seat and flicked through it. 

"Looks good," he said, after a few moments. "Not to look a gift horse in the mouth, but is there any particular reason you changed your mind?" 

Bellus replied nonsensically: "It turns out, O'wyn really did want to meet you and Joe for dinner." 

Turin looked up from the paperwork, baffled. "Okay?" 

"And he really did want me to stop being a Killjoy. He kept talking about it, but I thought it was all just talk. Turns out he meant it. He thinks being a Killjoy means I'll go to an early grave." 

"Statistically speaking, he's not wrong," Turin replied honestly. 

"He wants us to live in a house on Leith," she went on. "Or he did. Now he's divorcing me because he thinks I'm a liar. I never lied to him, I just forgot to mention certain things." Bellus exhaled deeply and noisily. "I didn't tell him you offered me the warrant broker job." 

"I've been on at you about that for weeks," Turin couldn't help pointing out. "You didn't mention it to your husband?" 

"Oh, don't you start too, Turin, Joe's already taking his side," Bellus replied angrily, "they're friends now, apparently, O'wyn and Joe. O'wyn heard about the dinner party. I mean, he heard about it from someone who thought it was an actual dinner party. He was damn furious about that, I can tell you. Then somehow or other he got in contact with Joe and I don't know _what_ Joe told him but now they're besties, apparently, it doesn't matter because I'm getting him back, I'll take the warrant job and I'll buy a house on Leith and I'll do whatever else he wants and I'll get him back. I will. I have a plan and I intend to follow through. So am I still suspended for two weeks?" 

"Hells no, I need a warrant broker now. You start tomorrow, and you're spending the rest of the afternoon going over rules and procedures with me." 

"Fantastic." 

"But first you're going to witness Fancy's swearing in as a Killjoy, and you're going to take it seriously and be supportive." 

"He's really going with 'Fancy Lee'?" 

"Apparently. If you think you can talk him out of it, please try, but he's insisting it's his actual name, now." 

"Actually, that makes sense," Bellus mused. 

"In what way does 'Fancy Lee' make any kind of sense?" 

"He did the name-changing thing to piss people off, and I've never seen you as pissed as when he insisted on 'Fancy Lee'. I thought you were going to have an aneurism. It could be a way of pulling pigtails. Turin, I think my guy might have a little crush." 

"I don't know what you're talking about," Turin said briskly. "Anyway he's not your guy anymore, he's my guy now. Let's go get him sworn in." 

"You've got him partnered to Bel Hadar, right? Doesn't that make him Bel Hadar's guy?" 

"You're all my guys," Turin replied airily. "Come on." 


End file.
